OHARA Davies expects Josh Taylor to present him with the toughest fight of his career when the two men get this Glasgow grudge match on at the Braehead Arena on July 8. But he welcomes the challenge - because even he doesn’t know how good he can be yet. The 25-year-old from Hackney has won all 15 of his pro fights to date - with 12 of them coming by way of knock-out - while eight of Taylor’s unbeaten nine bouts have ended within the distance and Davies knows this will be his sternest examination to date. While he refused to conform to his stereotype by rising to the bait and playing to the galleries during Tuesday’s pre-fight press conference at the Marriott, the bad blood between the two camps continued afterwards when the two men co-incidentally met each other at Glasgow Airport as they waited for their return flights.

“I’m a very calm and collected person,” said Davies. “They’ll see the real me at Braehead Arena on July 8 – having a circus at a press conference is not the way to do it. This is something I’ve been training for all my life and it’s all that I’m focusing on. They were trying to get me to react but people never know what to expect from me and the people saw another side to me at the conference. Did my failure to respond rattle them? I don’t know what’s in their minds, to be honest. But I don’t want him to be rattled, anyway, to be honest – I want him to be in the best shape of his life. I’ve never had to move out of first gear in any of my fights so far so, if he can beat me, then I want to see how I’ll lose.

“My expectation is that this will be the hardest fight of my career,” Davies added. “I believe that to be the case but that’s why I’m in this game. I don’t want to have easy fights – I want to take on the hardest guys out there. I’m 15-0 and I’ve yet to be tested.Even I don’t know how good I might be because no-one’s taken me to the limit. I’ve never had a proper challenge but, if Taylor is the one to make me move through the gears, let’s get it on. I reckon that Taylor is the man to push me but maybe he isn’t. People said that Andrea Scarpa was the man and Derry Matthews was the man but they weren’t.”

Davies, a man with form for noising up home crowds in Liverpool, has never fought in Scotland but as a stablemate of Ricky Burns he has visited shows in Glasgow many times. “I love Glasgow and I’ve probably been there more often than Josh has,” he said. “I’ve been to lots of Ricky Burns’ fights and the atmosphere when he boxes is tremendous. Even if they boo me, I’ll enjoy it. As long as they make a noise it will fire me up and drive me on. This is going to be a fight to remember.”