Liam Smith has opened the door to an all-British clash with Conor Benn and admits he’d relish a meeting with ‘The Destroyer’ next.
Smith has been out of the ring since losing his rematch to Chris Eubank Jr in September, a bout Benn was supposed to have had first, prior to testing positive for the banned substance Clomiphene, which scuppered the fight.
Benn’s fighting situation is unclear after the BBBofC and UKAD were successful in an appeal on his temporary suspension being lifted, which is preventing him from fighting in the UK.
‘Beefy’ has revealed that Benn’s promoter, Eddie Hearn has previously mentioned a clash with the Ilford man to him and despite ideally preferring an interim fight first, the Liverpool man insists he would be willing to face his British rival next.
“Conor has been mentioned to me,” Smith told IFLTV.
“Like I’ve always said, I’d take the fight in a heartbeat.
“I’d love that fight next. If I have one in between then great.
“Like I say, it got spoke about when I was in Canada [for Artur Beterbiev vs Callum Smith].
“Eddie asked me would I fight him I said ‘of course, I’d love to.’
“It’s no point in me mentioning names until I’ve got, ‘there you go, we’ll give you one fight, then we’ll give you Conor for X amount.’
Smith, a former world champion at super welterweight, campaigned at middleweight to face Eubank Jr, whilst Benn, who has fought at welterweight for much of his career, has been at super welterweight for his past two fights which have taken place in America.
Smith says he still harbours hopes of becoming a two-weight world champion, but concedes his priority is securing the biggest fights possible, even if that doesn’t culminate in a world championship bout.
“At this stage and in the position I’m in, I’m coming off the back of a loss,” the 35-year-old added.
“So, I’m gonna be realistic, I’m not going to get a world title fight, am I.
“One win in a comeback fight is not going to get me a world title fight either.
“You know, it depends, but we’ll see.
“Like I say I’ll get my weight off properly. I’ll get back to 160 [lbs] next time around and then we’ll go from there.
“I’ll see how I am and see what realistic options I’ve got.
“Big fights obviously. I’m not going to carry on boxing if I’m not going to get big fights.
“I need fights that as they say are going to get me off the couch.”
