Joe Calzaghe Tickets

Joe Calzaghe
Known as 'Italian Dragon', Joseph William Calzaghe is truly 'a Pride of Wales'. Undisputed world super-middleweight champion is a Welsh boxer who also holds the Ring Magazine light heavyweight championships. Calzaghe is the current WBO and WBA world super middleweight champion. He holds notable wins over Chris Eubank, Jeff Lacy, Mikkel Kessler, and Bernard Hopkins and is a victor of the WBC, IBF, and British super middleweight championships.

A family man, Joe Calzaghe is proud of his Italian roots as well as heritage and regularly holidays in the country where his father/trainer Enzo was born. He has trained with his dad since the day he became professional. His father's gym also boasts interim WBO cruiserweight king Enzo Maccarinelli, Commonwealth light-middleweight champion Bradley Pryce plus WBA light-welterweight champion Gavin Rees, and prospects Nathan Cleverley, Harry Miles and Kerry Hope.

In 2007, Calzaghe became BBC Sports Personality of the Year on December 9, making hum the first winner of the award since jumper Davis Broome in 1960. Calzaghe began boxing at just the age of 9. The southpaw had over 120 fights and won four schoolboy ABA titles, followed by three consecutive senior British ABA titles from 1991 to 1993. His accomplishments made him only the second boxer in history to take away light middleweight and middleweight championships at welter.

Calzaghe surprised millions of people, leaving them enchanted in 1992 when he knocked down future WBO and IBF heavyweight world champion Chris Byrd as a middleweight. He faced his only ever defeat when he boxed at amateur level at the 1990 Welsh ABA final against Michael Smyth.

With Calzaghe's lightning fast hand-speed and power punching, plus his awkward southpaw stance, he has been ignored by the top Americans like Roy Jones Jnr and, until now, Hopkins. They have been coming up making unrealistic financial demands when offered fights. Current IBF 175 pound champ Clinton Woods has also turned down more-than generous offers.

Having retired his WBO and IBF super-middleweight crowns, Calzaghe yet went into fight against teak-tough Australian Sakio Bika in October 2006 in Manchester, England. He was 35 then. In a fight, Calzaghe had to contend with low blows, head-butts and numerous other infringements against Sakio Bika. teak-tough Australian. This fight proved to be a cut for the first time in his career by a stray head. Calzaghe was defeated with 117-110, 117-110 and 116-111 points and vacated the IBF title after the fight.

His boxing career followed a stunning points victory over Mikkel Kessler to add the WBC and WBA super-middleweight titles to his WBO crown. Joe had a career-best display at the Millennium Stadium, Cardiff in front of a record 50,000 fans in 2007. He switched and came up with new tactics mid-way through the fight to ensure a thrilling win and impressed the Americans watching the event live on channels.

Joe Calzaghe had an encounter with Bernard Hopkins in Las Vegas on April 19 as he aimed to be the greatest fighter to ever come out of Britain and the best boxer on the planet.

He continued extending his unprecedented record to 45 fights but only after by far the toughest test of his career against 43-year-old Hopkins in April 2008. Hopkins's big right hand had got Joe off to a flying start. But he fought back strongly in the second half of a fight which was marked by frantic exchanges. After the furious final round on stage, Calzaghe had been declared winner for his accuracy while Hopkins left the ring fuming at the verdict. Calzaghe's victory earned him the Ring magazine's version of the 175lbs title to add to the undisputed super-middleweight crown he still owns.

Joe Calzaghe, indeed, is the longest reigning world champion in boxing, and has been awarded an MBE by The Queen of Britain for his services to the sport. Calzaghe's ultimate target is Joe Louis' record 25 world title defenses, and equaling Rocky Marciano's 49-0 slate.