A rough life for Harrison

Audley Harrison was today warned that his next opponent will be a bruiser hired to give him a battering in the ring.

The Olympic champion's trainer, American Thel Torrance, said: "I want a guy who will come to attack. I want someone to rough up Audley."

That will give the 30-year-old Londoner something to ponder as he pounds the pavement on a training run less than 48 hours after felling Julius Long inside two rounds at Wembley Conference Centre.

Long, who is 7ft 2ins tall, was selected as the unbeaten Harrison's fourth professional opponent because of his size.

But while he travelled from Detroit carrying credentials of six wins from seven fights, the 24-year-old former basketball player was exposed as a novice.

The danger was that he might have overwhelmed Harrison with bull-like charges but Harrison coped competently and finished it with a left.

"I was happy with what I saw," said Torrance, who has worked with boxers of the calibre of Riddick Bowe, Larry Holmes, Joe Frazier and Wayne McCullough.

Having listened to renewed demands for Harrison to trade leather with more experienced and dangerous opposition, Torrance explained that his man needs to learn a different kind of boxing to that which won gold in Sydney.

"We have a development plan, and we're sticking to it," he said. "Audley has to learn how to fight all styles.

"That is why he fought Long. I understand that Audley didn't do too well with big guys as an amateur. Now, I can show him how to fight a big guy.

"If Long had been permitted to do what he wanted to do, he would have run Audley out of Wembley. But Audley handled him and that is progress.

"The next guy he fights will be superior to Long."

Harrison will seek to extend his unbeaten record to five fights either next month or in June.

Meanwhile, Joe Calzaghe is hoping his 10th successful defence of the World Boxing Organisation's super-middleweight title with a unanimous points win ove r experienced American Charles Brewer will bring it's own rich reward.

Calzaghe wants to fight undisputed world middleweight champion Bernard Hopkins and promoter Frank Warren is now working towards that end.