By Terence Dooley

Frankie ‘Fun Time’ Gavin turned down a Tenerife training camp last week due to his fear of flying, the 24-year-old instead decided to head back home to the Midlands in order to help Dudley’s prepare for his October 23rd British super-middleweight title showdown with Paul Smith at the ECHO Arena, Liverpool. 

McDermott, nicknamed ‘The Black Country Body Snatcher’, recently moved up from 160lb and has pooh-poohed claims that he will be cannon fodder for ‘Smigga’ come fight night.  Indeed, Darren, 17-2-1 (9), believes his sparring sessions with Gavin will ensure that he is razor-sharp come the first bell.

“It’s top quality sparring like I have never had before, it’s always been good but not like I have had this time.  It needs to be to ensure that I am too strong for Smith and will be 100 percent fit.  I am sure he’s expecting to go in there and bowl me over – he’s in for a shock,” declared the 6’ 1’’, 32-year-old fighter when speaking to expressandstar.com.

Gavin takes on Michael Kelly at the LG Arena in Birmingham for the vacant Irish light-welterweight title on September 17th; the light-welterweight outlined the reasoning behind the sessions, which took place at McDermott’s home-based gym.

“We have doing some soft, touch sparring but nothing too hard, as he’s a fair bit bigger than me!” revealed the 7-0 (6) boxer.  “It’s a nice place to train, certainly big enough and it has made sense for me to come here this week.”

Gavin, who won Gold at the 2007 World Amateur Championships, sees the Irish title as a springboard to bigger things; Frankie recently told boxingnewsonline.net that he hopes to go for the English and British titles once the Irish belt has been placed on the mantelpiece. 

He said: “I may go for the English title first against Nigel Wright or straight for the British title against Lenny Daws.  I’m ready for them now and I’m up for the challenge if it happens.  Nigel and Lenny are good champions, but they are the kind of fighters I need to be beating if I am to go on and win a world title.  After reaching the very top as an amateur, I want to do the same as a professional.  There is no way I am going to be content with just getting to domestic honours.”

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