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British champ Theophane offered slot on Mayweather v Ortiz bill

Ashley Theophane
http://ashleytheophane.com

On Tuesday I was offered a slot on the undercard of Floyd Mayweather Jr’s long awaited comeback fight against WBC World champion Victor Ortiz.

Floyd announced his comeback fight on his Twitter page at 12pm and a few hours later I was notified that Golden Boy Promotions had enquired if I was available to fight on September 17th, as part of the televised portion of the show.

It was a huge opportunity and I was hoping for a big name – but when I was told Jessie Vargas, I turned it down instantly. To me it felt like it could have been the Danny Garcia fight all over again, with Vargas not having a world ranking and me having nothing to gain from a win, but everything to lose.

The fight is over eight rounds and that was not appealing to me.

But just to get the call that they wanted me on the show was a good feeling, as the event will be televised in one million homes across America. Unfortunately that alone does not make it I fight that I simply cannot refuse.

I was offered a fight with Victor Ortiz back in September 2008, when I had just beaten former World champion DeMarcus Corley. The timing then also wasn’t right as I was only given two week’s notice.

It all goes back to that focus again. Sometimes you have to resist the temptation to take fights which look extremely tempting.

Tickets are now on sale for my British Title defence at Wembley Arena on Saturday 23rd July – buy them now online at http://ashleytheophane.com/tickets
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