Calzaghe deserves Cardiff send-off (From Bradford Telegraph and Argus)

Calzaghe deserves Cardiff send-off

11:22am Friday 14th November 2008

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Joe Calzaghe ripped through Roy Jones Junior as we knew he would. Jones has been past his sell-by date for a couple of years now.

I’ve never been a fan since he was found out pumping steroids. Cyclists and athletes are castigated for life for doing the same, yet the American was lauded in the fight build-up as some kind of boxing “legend”.

He’s not in the same league as Calzaghe, as was obvious in Madison Square Garden.

It was not the career-defining win from the Welshman that some will claim but he deserves all the plaudits for still doing it at the very top of his game after all these years.

It begs the question: what happens next?

Everyone seems to want to hurry him into retirement. His dad Enzo and Ricky Hatton have led the call for Joe to hang up his gloves.

But the boxer himself is making no rash decisions. Why should he?

There may not be an obvious name out there to finish on a high – Kelly Pavlik maybe – but Calzaghe has no reason to prove anything.

Yet I’d like to think there is one more fight in him; one final hurrah at Cardiff’s Millennium Stadium, where he can soak up the adulation he has earned.

The opponent hardly matters. Give Calzaghe his grand send-off.