BBC - Berkshire - Sport - Michael Sprott v Robert Sulgan: interview

Q:  How is Michael feeling ahead of his come-back fight?

A:  Yeah he’s feeling in good shape and he’s looking forward to fighting tomorrow night.

Q:  Tell us a bit about his opponent the Czech heavyweight champion Robert Sulgan, could he be dangerous?

A:  Yeah quite possibly, all we know about him is that he’s the Czech champ, he’s been in with Thomas Bosnin who fought Audley Harrison some time ago who gave Audley a really good fight, and Thomas Bosnin has beaten the Czech champ, so there’s a little bit of history for us.

Q:  It’s an opponent that came in at the last minute as the scheduled opponent failed MRI scan so there’s been a bit of chopping and changing around for Michael.

A:  The original opponent was an African guy and failed his scan and then we had to look elsewhere, the British scene is quite busy at the moment with heavyweight boxing so they decided to look abroad and bring in the Czech champ.

Q:  So what’s the aim for this fight, I guess overall to get another victory and get Michael back to his winning ways but to get a good workout as well?

A:  Exactly, we didn’t want to put Michael in with somebody that wasn’t in the top ten in Britain so we looked towards a champ from another county to measure Michael’s ability at the moment. Michael is in line to fight for the EU title, there was talk of him fighting Herbie Hide for that title, so we really need to get Michael to perform well tomorrow night and hopefully beat this guy and give us a measure of how far Michael is at the moment.

Q:  How do you think he’s feeling after his defeat back in the spring, has he got the hunger still there to carry on in his career?

A:  Absolutely, we decided to give him a long rest he went to Florida and he’s been on holiday in Amsterdam and all over the place and he’s in tiptop condition, he really wants to get back in the ring tomorrow night and is looking forward to carrying on his career.

Q:  Are many fans making the long trip to East London from Reading? Will there hopefully be a noisy Reading contingent?

A:  Hopefully yeah, east end of London on a Friday night is probably the most awkward place to get to, but yeah there’ll be lots of noise there tomorrow night cheering Michael on.