Chris Billam-Smith has achieved more than Cheavon Clarke as a professional fighter. But Clarke still has something Billam-Smith never got. They fight each other on Saturday in the headline bout at the Copper Box Arena in London, live on Sky Sports. 10 years ago, when they were amateur boxers, Clarke beat Billam-Smith in the final of the national championships.
The result spun their lives in different directions. It led Clarke onto the GB squad, where he excelled and became an Olympian. Billam-Smith never did win the elites.
He eventually turned professional, labouring on small hall shows at first though he rose to win British, Commonwealth, European and ultimately a world title. But losing to Clarke in that 2016 amateur final, one of Billam-Smith's two amateur losses to him, hurt. At the time Billam-Smith craved the national title.
He'd reached the final three years before and at that point in 2016 he was favoured to finally win it. It would have been his gateway to the Olympic programme. Instead Clarke, who'd drifted away from boxing before making an unheralded return, supplanted him as the country's amateur No 1.
Please use Chrome browser for a more accessible video player At the end of that intense three-round encounter, Clarke had his hand raised and danced in the ring as he took his victory. "I was dancing like a madman," Clarke recalled. "When I think about, if I didn't win that, would I have got the opportunity to go on the national team?
"Chev Clarke was not supposed to be in the final. On the way to the final I beat all the favourites that year." "I wouldn't dance as my celebration," Billam-Smith sighed, "but he won his fight, he can celebrate how he wants." What Billam-Smith wants is revenge. It's not easy beating a fighter who has already beaten you, but Billam-Smith did that with Richard Riakporhe.
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