EL GATO AIMING TO POUNCE ON AN IN-FORM EUBANK

With this week's world title action already done and dusted by Thursday morning, the boxing world's beady eyes will all be on Manchester this weekend as Jack Catterall looks to bounce back from defeat against Arnold Barboza Jr when he takes on the undefeated Harlem Eubank on his return to welterweight.

A fight that very much came out of nowhere before some respectfully tense social media exchanges, the Chorley man – who turned 32 on Tuesday – headlines a stacked card against the nephew of the great Chris Eubank Sr.

Prior to that is an intriguing undercard with a couple of cracking chief support fights and some of boxing’s future superstars looking to take one step closer to global stardom.

Manchester’s own Alfie Middlemiss and Niall Brown will be kicking off the card in keep-busy fights against two journeymen, followed by the return of former world champion Skye Nicolson, who will be hoping to bounce back from the first defeat of her career against Tiara Brown when she faces off with Carla Gonzales.

After that, we’ll see the highly anticipated professional debut of the supremely talented heavyweight Leo Atang, who – despite being just 18 – has a lot of hype and expectation around him, with Eddie Hearn already likening him to a young Anthony Joshua.

Olympian Pat Brown will be aiming to make it two wins in two weeks when he steps up against Lewis Oakford, and then to top off the undercard, William Crolla faces the toughest test of his career against the 11-2 Scotsman Fraser Wilkinson.

Now to the three main fights – and boy, don’t we have three potential crackers on our hands here.

Originally scheduled to fight Mikey Gomez Jr in a proper old-school grudge match before Gomez withdrew due to injury, Aqib Fiaz now faces the exciting Alex Murphy on just over two weeks’ notice.

Murphy suffered the first defeat of his career back in April in a Fight of the Year contender against Khaleel Majid, which could well have gone either way.

Stylistically, it’s a good replacement for Fiaz, with Murphy being similar to Gomez Jr in many aspects. As a fight though, it will deliver. Neither is blessed with huge one-punch power, but both love getting into a tear-up – despite how good they may be on the back foot.

It’s a proper 50/50, so don’t be surprised if we see a 10-round war here.

In the chief support to the main event, former 130lbs world champ Joe Cordina steps back up to lightweight as he looks to get his career back on track after a year out of the ring following his defeat to Anto Cacace.

Cordina – who was widely regarded as one of Britain’s best, and still is – has teamed up with Gary Lockett ahead of his return, where he will face the 17-1 Mexican Jaret Quiroz.

At 24 years old, Quiroz is yet to have a professional fight outside of Mexico, and with him being relatively unknown, that brings that risk element.

We’ve seen it time and time again – these unknown Mexicans coming to Britain causing upsets – and Cordina cannot afford to let that happen again.

A victory here will set him up nicely for potential all-British domestic clashes against the likes of Sam Noakes, Maxi Hughes, or even Josh Padley.

Now to the main event – and it’s a belter.

Jack Catterall, the former world title challenger and a man many believe should have been crowned as an undisputed world champion, takes on the undefeated Harlem Eubank in a fight which is potentially must-win for both.

Following his defeat to Josh Taylor back in 2022, Catterall strung four wins together, including victory over Taylor in their rematch, before falling just short against Arnold Barboza Jr last time out.

It was evident that that was by no means the best Catterall on the night, and now stepping up to welterweight, he’ll be hoping for a much better performance against a man who is yet to taste defeat.

Eubank, now 21-0, has been progressing nicely since making his professional debut back in 2017.

Victories early on against the likes of Martin McDonagh and Sean Dodd put him in good standing, before stoppage wins over Timo Schwarzkopf and Tyrone McKenna more recently – two fighters that Catterall has fought and beaten on points.

So, how will the fight go?

Well, Catterall needs to make a statement – and on paper, it looks the perfect opportunity for him to do that.

Up in weight in a fight where he is going to need to be the aggressor, we’re crying out to see the spite that we saw in his two fights against Josh Taylor.

Against Barboza, he looked a little gun-shy and a little fatigued – which would make sense, considering he’d been in back-to-back camps. But now, having not fought in what will be nearly six months, he’ll be refreshed – especially with half a stone less weight to cut too.

If he’s going to win this fight, he needs to start quickly. Get to Eubank early, use that stiff southpaw jab to create openings to head and body, and look to quite simply overpower Eubank.

If he gives Eubank confidence early on and lets him have success, this fight could ultimately be a lot trickier than many think it’ll be for him.

For Harlem, he needs to box. Barboza laid the blueprint down in Catterall’s last fight for how to beat him, and if Eubank is going to be victorious on Saturday night, he very much needs to follow that.

Use his speed, use his footwork, and frustrate Catterall. The only problem with that is the fact we are likely to see a completely different Jack Catterall – so Eubank will more than likely need to adapt.

Eubank was hurt by Tom Farrell when they fought back in 2022 at super-lightweight, and you’d think, going off that, Catterall will be able to put a big dent in him too. However, Harlem has improved massively – but the question is, has he improved enough to mount a serious threat to Catterall?

On Saturday night, we’ll find out.