Josh Taylor on Saturday and Lawrence Okolie on Sunday in a U.K. Weekend ‘Twin Bill’

There have been two undisputed junior welterweight champions in the four-belt era, Terence Crawford and Josh Taylor, and they may meet up at 147. But that’s putting the cart before the horse. Taylor must first get past Jack Catterall on Saturday before Taylor-Crawford becomes something more than idle speculation.

Taylor, from Pontrepans on the outskirts of Edinburgh, will have the crowd in his corner in this battle of unbeaten southpaws. A full house is expected at the OVO Hydro in Glasgow now that Scotland has lifted COVID restrictions. Taylor, the Tartan Tornado, will be making his first start since unifying the title with a unanimous decision over Jose Carlos Ramirez before a COVID-restricted crowd in Las Vegas. Taylor vs. Catterall will air live on Sky Sports in the UK and on ESPN+ in the United States.

Catterall (26-0, 13 KOs) hasn’t defeated anyone above the domestic level, but he has patiently paid his dues. He’s spent 21 months in the pole position for the WBO, having agreed to step aside so that Taylor could fight Ramirez for all the meaningful belts. A knee injury suffered by Taylor in training pushed this fight back from its originally scheduled date of Dec. 18.

Josh Taylor (18-0, 13 KOs) hasn’t been as active as Catterall, but he has fought much stiffer opposition. His last six opponents were a combined 136-1 at the time that he fought them. This will be Taylor’s third fight with Ben Davison in his corner. Davison also handles Leigh Wood who will be making the first defense of his WBA featherweight title in two weeks on his home turf in Nottingham with Michael Conlan in the opposite corner.

Taylor vs. Catterall is noosed to a deep but flaccid undercard. The co-feature, a 10-round featherweight contest, pits two-time Olympic gold medalist Robeisy Ramirez against Ireland’s Eric Donovan. This should be a stroll in the park for Ramirez who has won eight straight since suffering a shocking upset in his pro debut. The 36-year-old Donovan is 14-1 but has defeated only three opponents with winning records.

A 10-round contest between Nick Campbell (4-0, 4 KOs) and Jay McFarlane (12-5, 5 KOs) billed for the long-dormant Scottish heavyweight title, ought to be entertaining, if nothing else. Hot prospects Kieran Molloy and Kurt Walker make their pro debuts, and there’s a female fight between “blonde bombshell” Ebonie Jones and 40-year-old Greek invader Eftychia Kathopouli. The ladies are featherweights.

For boxing fans on the West Coast of the U.S., the action begins at 11 a.m.

On Sunday, the UK boxing scene shifts to the O2 Arena in London where Lawrence Okolie will make the second defense of the WBO cruiserweight title he won with a smashing performance over Krzysztof Glowacki. Born in London to Nigerian parents, Okolie, 29, has made great headway since hooking up with trainer Shane McGuigan. He’s 6-0 with McGuigan with all six wins coming inside the distance and 17-0 (14) overall. Michael Cieslak (21-1, 15 KOs) provides the opposition.

The six-foot-five Okolie, who would knock the pants off any bridgerweight you can name, has a good back story. A former McDonald’s burger-flipper, he took up boxing to lose weight after his weight ballooned to 260 pounds and proved to be so adept at it that he won a berth on England’s 2016 Olympic team. The great Cuban amateur Erislandy Savon spoiled his Olympic dreams, but that was almost a foregone conclusion considering the wide gap in experience.

A 32-year-old Pole, Cieslak suffered his lone defeat the hands of Ilunga Makabu in the Congo. At six-foot-three and with a 79-inch reach, he matches up well with the long-armed Okolie. Promoter Eddie Hearn calls him a “big banana skin,” Hearn’s way of saying that the Pole will provide Okolie with his toughest test.

In the semi-wind-up, Karim Guerfi, a 34-year-old-Frenchman with a 30-5 (9 KOs) record will make the first defense of his European featherweight title against former Commonwealth (British Empire) featherweight title-holder Jordan Gill (26-1-1, 7 KOs). Gill is favored in the 6/1 range.

Two undefeated heavyweights, six-foot-five slugger Fabio Wardley (12-0, 11 KOs) and six-foot-six southpaw Demsey McKean (20-0, 13 KOs) appear on the undercard. If they were fighting each other, the bout could be billed as the “Battle of Ipswich” as both hail from cities of that name in England (Wardley) and Australia (McKean).

Unfortunately, they aren’t fighting each other, but fighting opponents who figure to get whacked out in a hurry.

The Sunday show will be streamed on DAZN.

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