JUST months after welcoming Tyson Fury to his Bradford restaurant, the owner of popular the Mr T's in Great Horton Road is all set to welcome another boxing superstar.

Tauseef Malik has confirmed that the current WBC World Heavyweight Champion, Deontay Wilder, will be at the opening of the new Mr T's restaurant in Batley on Thursday evening.

Securing the American's services is a huge coup, but Mr Malik's ambition knows no bounds, and the boxing-themed restaurant has plenty more sporting royalty in the pipeline.

He enthused: "Rocky Balboa (Sylvester Stallone) is almost certainly coming, we're just confirming the details.

"(UFC star) Khabib Nurmagomedov was supposed to be coming in June. Something went wrong then but we're looking to do something with him when he's on his next UK tour.

"We're hoping to get Anthony Joshua and Mike Tyson to visit at some point too."

Wilder's appearance on Thursday is set to come more than two years after another American boxing legend came to Mr T's.

Floyd Mayweather visited the Bradford branch in March 2017, following a tour date in Liverpool, and Mr Malik says a huge business opportunity could be coming up as a result.

He said: "We're hoping to meet up with Mayweather's representatives in February next year, as he's hoping to help us open up a Mr T's in New York."

Mr Malik insists it was Mayweather and Fury's influence which attracted the attention of Wilder and his team.

He said: "He had heard about us from them and from social media in the USA. His team contacted us and asked to visit five months ago.

"I said he should come when we opened our new restaurant in Batley and his manager said that was fine.

"He should be there from about 6:30pm until 8:30pm, where he'll be trying our food and making the milkshake we've named after him, the Bronze Bomber (Wilder's nickame).

"His management have said that he will have pictures with about 100 fans outside, so he's not just doing something for the press, it's for the public too."

Mr Malik said that it was free for anyone to come along to the venue, on 400 Bradford Road in Batley, on Thursday and he encouraged people to turn up from 6pm onwards.

He insisted that the more people that turned up the better.

However, some of the huge crowd at Tyson Fury's appearance in February caused trouble, with an appeal issued after eggs and a brick were thrown at a police car, causing significant damage to the vehicle.

Mr Malik felt sure that there would be no repeat of those scenes in Batley when Wilder shows up.

He said: "We're going to have 15 or 20 security guards there and there's a massive car park at the venue. It's definitely going to be more organised than last time."

Finally, Mr Malik wanted to confirm that although Wilder is coming to the new Batley restaurant on Thursday, the venue would not officially be opened to the public until Monday.

He said this was to allow staff to finish their required training.