Josh Warrington "jealous and envious" of rival Leigh Wood ahead of showdown

01 October 2023 , 08:00

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Josh Warrington took in Leigh Wood's fight with Mauricio Lara earlier this year (Image: PA)

Josh Warrington insists the respect he and Leigh Wood have for each other will count for nothing once the bombs start landing.

The pair meet in Sheffield on Saturday with Wood’s WBA featherweight crown on the line. And Warrington, who is bidding to become a three-time world champion, said: “The respect doesn’t matter. Leigh has something I want. I’m jealous, envious of the position he is in.

“I had a fight with Carl Frampton a few years ago and I would go as far as to say I was a fan of his until I boxed him. The build-up was nothing but amicable and we ended up having the Fight Of the Year. In the first two rounds I absolutely banjo-ed him with one shot.

“But after the fight we embraced and he came into my changing-room, and now I’d go as far as to call him my friend. When it comes to it we’ll have little 8oz gloves on and we’ll be going there to bash each other up.”

Promoter Eddie Hearn would love the winner to fight IBF super-featherweight world champion Joe Cordina. Laughing, Warrington added: “The Cordina fight depends how much he’s going to pay me.

Leigh Wood vow to step towards Josh Warrington status with Mauricio Lara win

“I’ve been making featherweight for a long time so it would be nice to have the luxury to step up. But more than anything I want to go to America. It has been hanging over me a long time. Eddie said it, Frank Warren said it when he promoted me, Eddie said it again and it’s one of the reasons I went back to him.

“Apart from the heavyweights, who else will take a big fanbase over there? I strongly believe I’ll take some big numbers.”

In the past year, Warrington’s five-year-old-twins have started to realise their dad’s job isn’t exactly run-of-the-mill.

He said: “Some of their friends’ parents must have told their kids what I do and they’ve then told mine because they come home from school singing, ‘Oh, Warri, Warri’. We play a lot of music in the house but never Sweet Caroline, yet they come home singing it as well.

“I ask who has taught them and they just say, ‘The teachers’.”

Tom Hopkinson