LION Gym’s young boxing talent Liam Collier will no longer be involved at this weekend’s England Development Championships after undergoing surgery.

Collier was scheduled to attend the initial weigh in and preliminary round of the competition on Sunday, however, he has pulled out after he felt pain in his stomach in training this week.

Head coach, Khalil Alam, confirmed: “We decided as a team to put Liam through to the England Development Championships, with the weigh ins and preliminary rounds taking place this Sunday. Of course, Liam wanted to do well in this competition, and he’s been working tirelessly to get into the best shape to fight and perform at a high level. It’s a massive event for him and really, it’s what we’ve been working towards for the last three years.

“On top of that, he also had a bout scheduled for Friday (yesterday evening) to prepare him for Sunday, so he’s been working extremely hard in recent times.”

He added: “Unfortunately for Liam, he arrived at training on Tuesday with some stomach pains and they continued to get worse after he’d left the session. Initially, he thought the problem was appendix related, but the doctors later confirmed that it wasn’t the case, but it was instead related to his intestine and it meant that a major operation was required. Of course, he will be out for a prolonged period of time as he tries to recover properly.”

After speaking to Collier post operation, Alam said: “It was good to hear from Liam after his operation; that’s what kind of relationships we have with our fighters at Lion Gym. We all look out for each other.

“Of course, he’s very upset about the timing of all of this because this was his biggest fighting opportunity to date and it’s a competition that is well regarded in amateur boxing across the country. However, Liam is a tough lad and he’s very optimistic that he’ll be able to continue on his journey very soon.

“As his head coach, my job is to check up on him regularly and to make sure that when he does comeback into the sport, he’s more than ready to go. It’s a dangerous sport and you can’t go into it half-hearted. It’s a small bump in the road for Liam and at the gym we are all confident that he’ll make a strong return in the near future.

“When he does comeback, we will work him back up slowly and make sure that both us as coaching staff and him as a fighter are fully confident ahead of a ring return.”

Lion Gym are set to host their next show at the Bradford Hotel on November 18 where they will get to showcase a number of their up-and-coming talented fighters.

They'll also host two more shows in 2024, with the first coming on February 3 and the second coming on May 4.