Gloves off to a true professional

In the limelight grasping hand of world sport, Joe Calzaghe sticks out like a sore thumb.

Forget the flash private London night scene and the huge billboard faces advertising trainer brands; this man loves his sport and seeks no fulfilment from the fame that comes part and parcel with boxing. Indeed, the big bucks of boxing make it one of the most money-driven glamour sports on the globe. However, it is pleasing that in an age of shrieking celebrity, there is a low-profiling familiarity to Joe Calzaghe's every-day life. The boxer's life has certainly not embraced any lifestyle of fame initiated by the dollar signs.

Calzaghe has revealed that if he loses against Bernard Hopkins next week, he will retire from boxing and will never show his face in public again. But even if the former super-middleweight now light-heavyweight fighter continues his run to 45 matches without a loss, one can be certain his legacy as a British boxing great will not encourage him to indulge in the celebrity lifestyle.

Calzaghe hit the headlines 11 years ago, coming into the public eye with a spectacular win over Chris Eubank. This weekend's bout against Hopkins could prove to be the highlight of a career, one which includes being voted 2007 BBC Sports Personality of the Year: the result of over a decade of fighting without the bitter taste of defeat. But since then you could be excused of being ignorant of Wales' most-loved dual-Italian: he keeps a low-profile of Benedictine proportions.

Forget chauffeur driven journeys to the pristine Premiership training ground pitches of new. Calzaghe is coached by his father, a self-taught traine who has never boxed in his life. The office where all the hard work gets put in is a drab and derelict looking gym in his home town of Newbridge, South Wales. For Calzaghe, money is secondary to home comforts.

Calzaghe Sr. once parked 2 miles away from a weigh-in to avoid paying for any parking. Hardly the actions of the force behind a multi-millionaire.

It is revitalising that professionals like Calzaghe are on the scene. Perhaps it is his down-to-earth lifestyle that, in the familiar celebrity climate desert that we live in, supporters are suitably and thirst-quenchingly refreshed by his existence. The whole of Britain will be behind him this weekend against Bernard Hopkins.