Josh Kelly, the new IBF junior middleweight champion, knows he is a man in demand.
Kelly has been pulled in numerous directions since his crowning moment on Saturday night against Bakhram Murtazaliev in Newcastle.
“After a win like that, it just becomes a whirlwind of just different stuff and random stuff, you know?” Kelly smiled. “You’ll just get a random thing. You might get asked to go on a random TV show or something like that, I don’t know. It might just be one of those crazy things.”
But Kelly is thriving in it this time, for in 2021 after defeat against David Avanesyan the exact opposite was the case.
“It just really shows you that you can’t take anyone for granted who’s close to you, because sometimes when you get carried away with it, with the hype and everything else, you sort of just forget, but when I had that first loss, it really hit home,” he admitted.
“I was like, no, I’m not taking anyone for granted who’s done good things for us, helped us, and I’m going to put them first always. Keep the circle close and it’ll always be good.”
Kelly has since been linked to fights against the likes of Xander Zayas, who unified the WBO and WBA titles on the same night, Conor Benn and Jaron Ennis.
And he’s watched the fight back once since, with his coach Adam Booth.
“I was happy,” Kelly said of his performance. “I thought I could have used my jab a little bit more, but saying that, it’s like you’re in the firing range a tiny second-longer where you might get caught or [there’s] another shot, and it was just doing little fine margins. It was winning the moments in the fight where he was doing a lot of nothing. He was coming forward and pressing the fight, but he wasn’t really throwing anything. He wasn’t catching us. Then, when we engaged, I would end up getting the better of it and then moving off, and then ‘I’d better go back in,’ get the better of it, move off, and probably I’d say [do that] two or three times a round. I think that’s all I really needed to win the rounds.”
Kelly, having dropped Murtazaliev, came through a rocky ninth when he was floored himself by a hard left hook. As a consequence, he did not remember much of that session or the 10th.
BoxingScene asked Kelly two weeks ago whether victory would be the biggest moment of his career when it’s all said and done, and he said a night in the future would be.
But having experienced getting his hand raised and winning the title in the North East, he is not so sure.
“I think it was up there. It’s hard to beat that,” Kelly grinned. “It was crazy. It was like a dream. I still feel like I’m in a dream. I’m like, ‘is this real yet?’ I know it’ll take a couple of weeks to sink in. I didn't have no sleep [on the night]. I got about two hours the next day and then I had about six hours last night and that’s it.”
Of course, he will now be peppered with questions about the future and what might happen next.
“It’s crazy because the thing is, I think the ‘Boots’ fight will always be there, in my opinion. I think if he fights Vergil Ortiz or something like that, then that’s a difficult fight, but I think he’s always going to be there. I think he’s a really good fighter, so I think that fight’s always going to be there. So for me, first defense, do I want to go straight into probably the toughest fight in the division, which [although] I’d back myself against anyone, I can out-trick anyone, but do I want to really? I’ve just took a pressure fight there [against Murtazaliev]. I think for me, it’s still a pressure fight, but I think Conor Benn in the Stadium of Light just makes sense for the British fans. I don’t get why he’s calling out Shakur Stevenson. Obvioulsy he [Shakur]’s 135 and just moved up to 140, I’d be like, ‘Why is he [Benn] calling him out?’ I know it’s an American big name, but he’s got nothing in common, he’s got no history, he’s just calling him out for money, or a payday, or a big fight. I’ve got a legit world title, and he [Benn] was at 160, he boxed at 154 two or three times before he went to 160, so why not come and challenge me at 154 in the Stadium, a huge British blockbuster that would sell out the Stadium of Light in huge numbers, and it would be a nice win for me. It’s a free win, I might as well take that free win in between me and getting all the other big lads in the division, so I get a bonus. Why not make it him?
“There’s people very high up, especially in the directors’ box, in Sunderland and they were really pushing for me to fight there in June or July. We’ll see, but they said if Conor Benn accepts it, finds a pair of balls, they’ll put it straight on. I don't know if he wants this. I don’t know if a) he really wants a legit world title. And b), is he too happy making the money fighting these guys, where it's like a win-win for him. ‘I’m boxing this guy, so it’s like a win for me.’
“And Shakur Stevenson is a full weight below him, so now he’s going down to fight someone else. It’s crazy, ‘You fought a 160, I doubt you can make 147.’ He says he can, whatever. But 154 is sat there, I’m the IBF world champion, we’ve had history, we’ve always chatted shit to each other in the past and I’ll just put him to sleep. It’s a huge fight.”
Kelly became Adam Booth’s fourth world champion, alongside David Haye, Andy Lee and Ryan Burnett. Haye was a two-weight champion and Burnett was unified, but Booth was overcome by emotion on Saturday after his latest lengthy journey to the mountain top.
It was Kelly who had said he felt Murtazaliev was “the perfect fight for him” months ago while everyone else said he was the division’s boogeyman.
Kelly has believed it has been his destiny all along.
It even worked out that Sunderland played on the Monday night rather than the Saturday afternoon, so Kelly was able to walk on the pitch with and be presented to the crowd as his soccer team defeated Burnley 3-0.
“I didn’t even know I was invited to the game until the day after the fight,” he laughed. “And then you’re invited to the game, and then I went and met all the Sunderland legends, obviously Niall Quinn, Kevin Ball, Stefan Schwarz, Peter Reid, it was unbelievable. I was mixing with all them, we were talking, I was getting [phone] numbers, and I was like, ‘Wow, this is crazy.’ I got on the pitch, I had like the craziest reception ever.”
Inevitably, talk moves onto what’s next. Benn is top of the list. Ennis is possible. Then there’s Zayas.
“I think I beat Zayas,” said Kelly. “I watched his performance against Abass [Baraou], I didn’t really think it was too special, but I think he’s young and inexperienced, and I think I can beat Zayas, but for me, that obviously unifies the vision. That’s crazy; I’ll do that. But for me, obviously, the fight will make sense for me at the moment is that Benn one and I’ll even put it out there, it’s easy money, it’s an easy fight, it’s an easy fight for me. It’s easy money.”
For now, however, the 31-year-old ex-Olympian – who is 18-1-1 (9 KOs) – can revel in his title triumph.
All week, signs pointed to his victory and Kelly embraced them all, such as getting into a car on fight night with the license plate ‘NEW’ as part of it. We might have looked at them as coincidence but Kelly bought into them.
“God was at work that week, I promise you, it was weird,” he added. “I was praying every night, and seeing things. I was just like, this can’t be a coincidence, and I just thought I’ll put all my worries and stresses in His hands, and just go in there and relax, fight to the game plan, and that’s what I did, and I come out on top.”
Kelly had envisaged knocking Murtazaliev down, he saw his hand getting raised and he saw himself with the title.
“I told you; I’d seen it. I was praying, I was just seeing it. He [Murtazaliev] was the most avoided fighter in the 154 division. No one wanted to fight him, so I was the guy who dethroned him. I think that goes underrated as well. All these other guys dodged him, I was the one who stepped up and fought him.”
