The former enfant terrible, light-welterweight contender Ohara Davies insists he has “grown up and calmed down”.<\/span><\/p>\n The 31-year-old from Hackney, known as ‘Two Tanks’, turned pro in 2014. Since then he has frequently been featured in tabloids, while engaging in vicious spats with other boxing figures. <\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n Now looking forward to a career-defining fight with Newcastle’s Lewis Ritson on 4 March, he says he is steadier, more measured.<\/span><\/p>\n “My career’s had ups and downs,” he says softly. <\/span><\/p>\n “And yes, many of the downs have been my fault. Things that I’ve said, the way that I’ve acted. <\/span><\/p>\n “There’s been some injustice, too, but I’m not interested in playing the villain any more,” he adds. <\/span><\/p>\n “Now I’m being me.” <\/span><\/p>\n To some degree, Davies has found himself caught in the catch-22 faced by many boxers for much of his career.<\/span><\/p>\n Fighters are pressured to sell themselves, to be marketable. The social media age demands that more than ever and courting controversy is one way to attract attention.<\/span><\/p>\n “I’m not a media-trained puppet like some of these guys, who speak a certain way and say certain things to keep sponsors happy,” Davies says. <\/span><\/p>\n “I’ve always tried to express myself, but I was never a massive ticket seller. It’s tough to get friends and acquaintances to buy tickets every time you fight. <\/span><\/p>\n “In my second pro fight, I only just covered the basic expenses. I think I made a hundred pounds.”<\/span><\/p>\n These harsh realities led Davies to a personal realisation. The decision he made early on would shape his career.<\/span><\/p>\n “I said to myself that for this to work, I needed to be a personality, an entertainer, be brash,” he explains. <\/span><\/p>\n “I didn’t have enough people paying to watch me win, so instead I would entice people who wanted to see me lose. <\/span><\/p>\n “And it worked. I boxed Derry Mathews in 2017 at the O2 in London, and it was packed. He’s from Liverpool but the whole arena was on his side. <\/span><\/p>\n “I was booed in my hometown. But the funny thing is, it felt great. I got a surge of adrenaline and finished him in three rounds. <\/span><\/p>\n “I came to love that, that image of being the bad guy.”<\/span><\/p>\n It was this decision to be the agitator that contributed to Davies’ most controversial moment in 2017, an incident which saw him <\/span>dropped by former promoter<\/span><\/a>, Eddie Hearn of Matchroom Sport. <\/span><\/p>\n While promoting a fight with Hull’s Tommy Coyle, Davies made comments about the Sun newspaper on Twitter.<\/span><\/p>\n Coyle was a vocal critic of The Sun because of its coverage of the Hillsborough disaster, in which 97 fans died as a result of a crush during the FA Cup semi-final between Liverpool and Nottingham Forest on 15 April 1989.<\/span><\/p>\n Davies responded by urging his followers to “buy the Sun”.<\/span><\/p>\n He apologised but Hearn cancelled his promotional contract as a result.<\/span><\/p>\n “The fans don’t like me, which made it easy for promoters to treat me a certain way. If they treated another boxer like that, there would be a backlash,” Davies claims.<\/span><\/p>\n “They thought I was disrespecting the families of the tragedy, but I was just replying to and goading my opponent, simple as that. <\/span><\/p>\n “To be honest, when I wrote that particular tweet, I had never even heard of the Hillsborough disaster. <\/span><\/p>\n “But people chose to interpret it that way and I was thrown under the bus, which caused a massive delay in my career.”<\/span><\/p>\n‘I came to love the image of being the bad guy’<\/h3>\n
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<\/span><\/span>‘The biggest fight of my career’<\/h3>\n
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