Lawrence Okolie aims to be a unified cruiserweight world champion like his hero David Haye.
Okolie had pictures of Haye on his bedroom wall as a kid growing up in Hackney and was inspired by him winning the WBC, WBA and WBO cruiserweight titles.
Okolie, 28, wants to emulate Haye ahead of the first defence of his WBO crown tonight against Dilan Prasovic.
“This is a mandatory defence and once this is out of the way, Eddie Hearn knows what I want,” he said.
“I had pictures of David Haye on my wall as a kid, with all the belts, and I want to recreate that picture myself.
“In the cruiserweights, probably the best one in this country has been David Haye as he unified three out of four belts and then went up to heavyweight to win a world title.
“I want to go down as the best cruiserweight in Britain and the fact I won the world title at a reasonable age, means there’s an opportunity to do that and be undisputed.
“I think it’s possible as long as I win this one and then a unification or two. I’ve got a couple of years to go down as one of Britain’s best cruiserweights, so I have to go make it happen.
“I want to add myself to the list of the best ever.”
Callum Smith claims he can win a world title at light-heavyweight in his first fight at 175lbs against Lenin Castillo.
Smith, 31, has stepped up with new trainer Buddy McGirt after losing his WBA Super and Ring magazine super-middleweight titles to Saul ‘Canelo’ Alvarez last time out in December.
“I was world champion at 168lbs and I believe I’m good enough to become world champion at 175lbs,” he said.
“This is a good first step into this division and I feel confident with Buddy that I can do the exact same at this weight.”
