The Great Viking Defeat

Joe Calzaghe - Undefeated Undisputed SMW World Boxing Champion

"No1. Sports personality of 2007"

This weekend just passed Joe Calzaghe the 'Welsh Warrior' cemented his boxing legacy and career achievement by defeating the World Champion 'Viking Warrior' Mikkel Kessler and unifying all of the boxing belts for his fighting weight.

This achievement means that he is now the undisputed World Champion at the Super Middleweight division.

Not only is the Welsh Warrior now the undisputed World Champion, he is also an undefeated World Champion, he has been undefeated in the last 17 years of his boxing career and for the last 10 of those 17 years he has held the WBO World Title belt, beating every challenger who has stepped through the ropes and into the ring with him.

This man's achievement within boxing is historical and the stuff of legend, that's why he is named 'The Pride of Wales' by the people of Great Britain.

The prestigious WBO belt that Joe Calzaghe has held onto for the last 10 years was taken from Chris Eubank, who had himself taken it from Nigel Benn, two legendary fighters in their own rights. Those names etched into the history of this belt shows the prestige of this World title that Joe Calzaghe has held onto and shows his historical legendary position within the sport.

There is no other sporting personality in Britain who has achieved anything that comes close to what Joe Calzaghe has achieved this year and is the reason why in my mind 'The Pride of Wales' should win this years award.

This year marks the 10th anniversary of him first obtaining the WBO belt from Chris Eubank and the 'Welsh Warrior' cemented his status as the best fighter in his division by fighting and beating Mikkel Kessler and unifying all of the World title belts.

The Welsh Warrior goes into 2008 as the undefeated, undisputed Super Middleweight Champion of the World and shows that he is a 'special sporting icon' and an inspiration to many in Great Britain and around the World and should be recognised as such by everyone within sport.

Great Britain is crying out for a role model for our youth and young people, who are running around our towns and cities, stabbing, shooting and killing one another and terrorising innocent people in the process. Joe Calzaghe in my mind is that inspirational role model that this Nation is seeking for, the only thing is, is that the media have not given this man or his team the proper platform to promote themselves and what they are about so that people from across this land can know who this modern living legend from the Welsh Valley's is, they would rather give that platform to Amir Khan who is not a scratch on the 'Welsh Warrior', who could in no way unite and inspire our youth to want for something more in this life, he is a fabricated plastic role model created by his 'Team Khan' business advisers that does no good for anyone other than himself and his 'Team Khan' bank account.

The story behind Joe Calzaghe's rise to boxing stardom, legendary status and the history books as one of the very few fighters to have ever been undefeated in so long is the stuff of myth and fantasy, only this is no myth or fantasy this is a reality and shows why this man is 'The Pride of Wales' and that his team have so much to give the people of this Great Britain and not just World Championship victories in the boxing ring.

This World Champion boxer started his school life being bullied like so many other vulnerable children across the country. He has no problem openly speaking about it because he knows personally the trauma that some kids go through in their early years of life from personal experience. Rather than becoming a bully himself he got into sports out of school and his dad ended up taking him to a local boxing gym in Wales. Father and son had absolutely no knowledge of boxing but they both stepped through the door of that gym together, and after his first few times being there the local trainer told his dad that he had a good boxer there in his son. His father Enzo was as much a novice as young Joe but they both started out on this journey together with Eno Calzaghe working with and training his son.

From this father son partnership that has lasted Joe Calzaghe's sporting career that started with both of them knowing absolutely nothing about boxing we the people of Great Britain now have a living boxing legend in our midst in the form of the 'Welsh Warrior', and 'Team Calzaghe' have created a fighting stable of World Class Champion boxers like Enzo Maccarinelli.

The story behind Joe & Enzo Calzaghe and their career achievements is special and unique and this Nation should honour them for that, we should also use them if they would allow, to inspire others at a time when inspiration is very much needed. Joe Calzaghe personally inspired me after watching him beat the American Jeff Lacy, at a time when I was at one of my darkest lowest points I watched this on ITV1 and it was inspirational, after 12 rounds the 'Welsh Warrior' had a fan for life, I knew I had just witnessed a very special British sporting talent and it was the best TV in a long while - The unification class with Mikkel Kessler is to be shown on BBC1 at 1pm on Saturday if you want to see what I am talking about.

The sporting personality of the year is going to come down to two people, Joe Calzaghe and Lewis Hamilton.

Lewis Hamilton has achieved great things within Formula 1, he is now a British icon ,but an inspiration? I don't know, he doesn't inspire me I'm sorry to say, and does he inspire those young kids running around our towns and cities with knives and guns? No I don't think so either, how many Formula 1 training grounds are there for these kids to go to, to aspire to becoming an F1 driver like Hamilton? F1 is so far out of reach from the youth of our Nation that you have to ask the question; who does Lewis Hamilton inspire? Of course he inspires the pop stars and film stars of Monte Carlo, but does he inspire the young kids on the verge of becoming violent criminals and throwing their lives away in gang crime and culture? I don't think so.

Could an undisputed legendary World Champion boxer inspire our youth who are on the verge of a life of violent crime? Yeah I think so. Are there boxing gyms across our Nation for these young kids to train? Of course, In nearly every city with many more needed. Could our youth really be inspired by a boxing great? For British people reading this post ask yourself what you think of Nigel Benn, Chris Eubank, Lennox Lewis, Frank Bruno, Barry McGuigan to name just a few, were they inspirational in their day?

The minister for sport should take a serious long hard look at what good Boxing can do for the youth of this Nation if he truly wants to help make a difference - I'm sure 'Team Calzaghe' would give you some words of wisdom.

No matter who wins the sports personality award of 2007, no one can take away the achievements of these two men, but lets now forget here that Joe Calzaghe is an undisputed, undefeated World Champion of 10 years and Lewis Hamilton is a second place winner in his first year.

In Joe Calzaghe's own words "I am a winner not a loser".

The worst travesty in sport would be Amir Khan coming anywhere near winning due to the fact that he has done nothing for sport other than use it to fill his bank account, and he nearly killed someone with his car who will now be partly crippled for the rest of his life.

As we go into 2008 and look forward to the 'American Invasion' with the 'Welsh Warrior' fighting the 'Executioner' Bernard Hopkins, the whole of Great Britain should be behind their Champion and every young person in the U.K should know exactly who Mr. Joe Calzaghe is, their British sporting diamond.

Please cast your vote: Daily Mail