Billy Joe Saunders after Beijing Olympic gold

[divingbrit]

A teenager whose great grandfather was a bare-knuckle champion of the gypsy fairground booths is being tipped for boxing stardom of a more conventional kind - by winning an Olympic welterweight medal with a pair of gloves on his fists.

Billy Joe Saunders, 18, who lives with his family on a gypsy caravan site on the outskirts of Hatfield in Hertfordshire and boxes out of the Hoddesdon club, is already being compared with Amir Khan after his impressive progress since moving from the junior to the senior ranks six months ago.

Since then he has won 26 bouts out of 26, culminating in the gold medal at one of Europe's most prestigious tournaments in Bulgaria earlier this month where his four scalps in the space of four days included that of the highly rated Cuban No 1, Carlos Bantuer. His performance earned him the boxer of the tournament award.

advertisementOriginally selected for Britain's Olympic development squad for the 2012 London Olympics, Saunders has now been fast-tracked into the 2008 "podium group" and this week will be one of seven British fighters travelling to Pescara, Italy, for the first of two European Olympic qualifying tournaments.

A top-three finish will guarantee him a place in Beijing alongside the four British boxers who have already qualified via the World Championships in Chicago last October.

Head coach Terry Edwards, who trained Audley Harrison before the Sydney Olympics in 2000 and was in Khan's corner in Athens four years ago, has every faith that Saunders will be on the plane to China.

"Billy Joe and Amir are different boxers with different temperaments and attitudes but what they have in common is that they are both precocious young talents," he said.

"Amir Khan was 17½ years old when he was in the final at the Olympics and Billy Joe, if he got to the final, would be just 19, so there's not a lot of difference between them in age.

"Billy Joe has got the potential not only to go to Beijing but to go to the London Olympics in 2012. He's a tremendous talent."

Boxing is certainly in Saunders' blood. His great grandfather, Absolom Beeney, was a champion prize-fighter in the brutal world of bare-knuckle boxing - a means of conflict that continues to this day in gypsy culture, mainly as an organised way of settling arguments.

His father, Tom, a former amateur boxer, was involved in a bare-knuckle fight himself "to sort things out many years ago" but Billy Joe and his older brother Tom Jnr have stuck to Marquess of Queensberry rules since they were taken to their local boxing gym as young boys. Tom Jnr is now a professional boxer.

"I don't want my sons tarred with anything," said Tom Snr. "My two sons are boxers. Bare-knuckle boxing is well known within the travelling community but I've always steered my two boys away from that side of it. They've got no need to go down that road because it's a mug's road.

"It's the way the travelling community really sorts out its disagreements. It still goes on but seven times out of 10 it doesn't go beyond an argument. Only now and then does it flare up.

"If people in the community come to blows then it is just stopped and it's a case of trying to get them to talk it out first. If they can't sort it out, and they've all got to live together, then one bloke would say, 'Let's just have an old-fashioned punch-up and then shake hands afterwards.' That's how it gets sorted."

Billy Joe's fists may be encased in padded gloves but they are still proving effective weapons. It is a measure of his good form that the GB selectors have given him his Olympic chance in place of the British team captain and former world bronze medallist, Neil Perkins, who fights at the same weight.

"Over in Bulgaria I impressed and they liked what they saw, so now I've been given my chance," said Billy Joe. "First I've got to qualify for the Olympics and then hopefully I'll go out there and win a medal for my country.

"The gold medal is what I'm really aiming for. You can't go any higher than the Olympics in amateur boxing, and I'm aiming to get to the top."

Billy Joe, who has a baby son, Billy Joe Jnr, has become something of a celebrity among the gypsy community. "I'm pretty well known all over the country among all the travellers.

"The news gets round by word of mouth."

What worries father Tom, though, is how the wider general public will react to his boy. He is hoping it will provide some good publicity for travellers after so much negative media coverage.

"People must understand that there are not just Irish gypsies but there are English, Welsh and Scottish gypsies and they've all got their own cultures. This country doesn't understand travellers and that's why people need to sit down, ask us questions and learn about us.

"Take unlicensed fights. People talk about gypsies doing that but English Romany gypsies like us only fight with bare knuckles to sort out our arguments from time to time. We don't do it for money."

Nor will Billy Joe be fighting for money while he pursues his Olympic ambitions, beginning with the all-important qualifying tournament that starts next weekend.

"He's got a great future in front of him," said Tom. "For a travelling boy to come from his background and achieve what he's achieved has made us very proud."

www.telegraph.co.uk/hart