Joshua Clottey will use his feud with Freddie Roach as motivation for next weekend's daunting WBO Welterweight championship bout with Manny Pacquiao, the Filipino pugalist. The 32-year-old Ghanian is one of many admirers of Pacquiao, who is a seven-weight world champion, but that respect does not extend to Pacquiao's trainer, Roach, after the American's verdict that his charge will knock Clottey out when they meet at Cowboys Stadium on March 13.
"I'm going to fight because of somebody," Clottey said, as he prepares for the bout in New York. "I'm fighting Pacquiao, but I'm fighting somebody else outside the ring. Nobody knows. I'll let everybody know after the fight. It's my secret." However, it appears the mystery man is none other than Roach, if Clottey's manager, Vinnie Scolpino, is to be believed. "He wants to beat Freddie Roach. That's his motivation," Scolpino said. "He wants to put him in his place. He beats Pacquiao, he puts Freddie in his place, too.
"Roach says he [Pacquiao] is going to knock him out." Scolpino said Clottey was offended by the prediction. "I'm in the best shape of my life," said Clottey, a former IBF Welterweight champion, whose record stands at 35 wins with three losses and one no contest. Pacquiao, named Fighter of the Year for the last two years and Fighter of the Decade by the Boxing Writers Association of America, is making his first defence of the title he won by stopping Miguel Cotto in the 12th round of their fight last November in Las Vegas.
Clottey gets his chance to claim arguably the most prized scalp in boxing because of the Filipino's fight with Floyd Mayweather Jr falling through over arguments on dope testing. * With agencies
BAD BOYS: RIDE OR DIE
Director: Adil El Arbi and Bilall Fallah
Starring: Will Smith, Martin Lawrence, Joe Pantoliano
Rating: 3.5/5
Confirmed bouts (more to be added)
Cory Sandhagen v Umar Nurmagomedov
Nick Diaz v Vicente Luque
Michael Chiesa v Tony Ferguson
Deiveson Figueiredo v Marlon Vera
Mackenzie Dern v Loopy Godinez
Tickets for the August 3 Fight Night, held in partnership with the Department of Culture and Tourism Abu Dhabi, went on sale earlier this month, through www.etihadarena.ae and www.ticketmaster.ae.
Innotech Profile
Date started: 2013
Founder/CEO: Othman Al Mandhari
Based: Muscat, Oman
Sector: Additive manufacturing, 3D printing technologies
Size: 15 full-time employees
Stage: Seed stage and seeking Series A round of financing
Investors: Oman Technology Fund from 2017 to 2019, exited through an agreement with a new investor to secure new funding that it under negotiation right now.
EMIRATES'S REVISED A350 DEPLOYMENT SCHEDULE
Edinburgh: November 4 (unchanged)
Bahrain: November 15 (from September 15); second daily service from January 1
Kuwait: November 15 (from September 16)
Mumbai: January 1 (from October 27)
Ahmedabad: January 1 (from October 27)
Colombo: January 2 (from January 1)
Muscat: March 1 (from December 1)
Lyon: March 1 (from December 1)
Bologna: March 1 (from December 1)
Source: Emirates
The biog
Hobby: Playing piano and drawing patterns
Best book: Awaken the Giant Within by Tony Robbins
Food of choice: Sushi
Favourite colour: Orange
In numbers
Number of Chinese tourists coming to UAE in 2017 was... 1.3m
Alibaba’s new ‘Tech Town’ in Dubai is worth... $600m
China’s investment in the MIddle East in 2016 was... $29.5bn
The world’s most valuable start-up in 2018, TikTok, is valued at... $75bn
Boost to the UAE economy of 5G connectivity will be... $269bn