“I’d be disappointed if I didn’t get a
2:1,” says Nathan Cleverly, sitting upstairs in Bargoed Social Club.
He’s nearing the end of a Pure Maths degree at Cardiff University and
he’s discussing his options. “If I had to choose an alternative
career I would probably join the RAF as an officer or maybe work in investment
banking.”
They aren’t words you often hear from boxers, let alone a boxer who in
2008 was accused by some – including me - of making a grotesquely stupid
decision. “A lot of people don’t really understand why I did it,” Nathan
laughs. “But I know I made the right decision.”
When we meet, on a cold morning in February, it’s been a shade longer
than five months since the 22-year-old made the call to leave Enzo Calzaghe’s
Newbridge stable of world champions and work with his dad Vince. It brought
to an end a relationship that had been in place since Nathan was 15, a period
when he would walk daily in the footsteps of Joe Calzaghe and Enzo Maccarinelli.
Joe used to fondly describe Nathan as his “protégé”,
and both Enzos identified him as a future champion. They would all spar together,
Nathan learning from the best and appearing on Joe’s undercards in Las
Vegas and in the Millennium Stadium.
It seemed to be the perfect arrangement, but it wasn’t.
“
I nearly quit boxing,” Nathan says. At the time the reason given was
that Nathan didn’t want to be caught in the crossfire of Joe Calzaghe’s
legal battle with Frank Warren, who is Nathan’s promoter. But there was
more to the split. “You have the big boys in any boxing gym,” Nathan
explains. “If you have guys with titles, they are the top dogs and the
rest of you fit in around them.”
At one point in 2008, Enzo Calzaghe had three world champions working in his
gym: Joe, Enzo and Gavin Rees. Added to that, Commonwealth champion Bradley
Pryce and world title challenger Gary Lockett, it left Nathan, a talented rookie
with no titles, down the pecking order.
“
Don’t get me wrong,” Nathan says. “Enzo and the boys did
so much for me, I learnt so much. How can you not learn when you’re working
next to Joe Calzaghe or Enzo Mac, or one of the other guys? But you can only
learn so much that way. I needed what was best for me, sparring tailored for
me and not the others.”
There was another key downside to his role, one that took away something essential
to a boxer’s mentality: confidence. Fighters need confidence to step
in a ring and fight. As an understudy - albeit an immensely talented one with
enormous potential - Nathan would every day go in the ring with world champions
who, at that moment in time, were more advanced than him. “I just felt
like it got to the point where I couldn’t move forward in that situation,” Nathan
says. “I needed to be in a situation where I was the centre of attention
in the gym, that things moved a bit more around me. I needed to be more than
a sparring partner.”
So he took the plunge and did what many in the British boxing scene considered
unthinkable.
“
You have to be selfish to reach the top and that’s where I am aiming,” he
says. He left and made the seven-mile trip to the small gym in Bargoed, where
dad Vince and Alan Davies, a familiar face from his amateur days, train him.
Mentally he has come a lot further.
“
He just seems so much happier,” says Vince.
“
I feel great, to be honest,” Nathan adds. “I could have walked
away from boxing, I have options outside the ring. But instead I’ve come
back to basics and I’ve got my hunger back. It’s working for me
being here and I think it shows.”
The evidence suggests he is right. He won the Commonwealth light-heavyweight
title in his first fight back and has defended it twice. He is hoping for a
crack at Dean Francis’ British title in the near future. And then the
big one. “I think I’ll be world champion in 18 months,” he
says.
It’s a grand claim for a lad stood in a chilly gym up some stairs from
a bar in Bargoed, but he’s already proven he’s not stupid.
For more about Nathan including details of upcoming bouts see www.nathancleverly.co.uk
Seconds away!
Riath Al-Samarrai corners one of Wales’ brightest
new boxing talents
Boxing Cleverly
