Jamie McDonnell Plays Down Sanders Reports

By Andrew Wake: British, Commonwealth and European bantamweight champion Jamie McDonnell has declared “I’m staying put”.

Over the New Year a number of stories claiming that the Doncaster man had left the stewardship of Dave Hulley and Stefy Bull to team up with Nigel Benn’s former trainer Kevin Sanders have flooded the internet.

But McDonnell insists that he never had any intention of leaving the Mexborough-based duo which has tutored him during two years of unprecedented championship success.

The Yorkshireman does admit that a move to Sanders was suggested to him by manager Dennis Hobson, but contrary to reports, it was a far from a done deal.

“I’ve put my foot down and said I don’t want to move,” Jamie told SecondsOut.

“This gym is where it all started so why change it? Everything has gone good, the gym is spot on and my brother is down here as well as all my mates so moving just felt wrong.”

For Stefy Bull the news of McDonnell’s supposed departure came as something of a shock. He’d just enjoyed a holiday abroad over Christmas and knew nothing of the story until he read it on Boxrec News.

After a period that has seen the bantamweight sensation win three titles against top notch opposition such as Ian Napa, Jerome Arnould, Stephane Jamoye and Stuey Hall, Bull finds it perplexing that anyone could even suggest a change is needed.

“Why change a winning formula? A winning fighter is a happy fighter and look at where Jamie has gone since he started with us,” Bull stated.

“We’re not playing at the game, we’re a serious outfit and we’re pushing Jamie onto winning world titles. Who’d have thought that on six weeks notice we’d have beat Napa? A 3-1 underdog, we didn’t have a prayer and we beat him and kicked on.”

The comments are echoed by co-trainer Dave Hulley. He said: “When Jamie came to us he was number four in Britain and now he’s number two in the world.

“I think the story with this moving on thing is a break down in communication. His manager wanted him to look at using someone else but the fighter himself didn’t”.

Another comment that was made during the saga which Bull finds baffling is Sanders’ claim to have been picked for the job after taking McDonnell on the pads in Las Vegas.

“It’s been stated on the internet that Jamie was doing the pads with him but he didn’t even lace a glove on so we don’t know where all that has come from,” he said.

“I actually feel sorry for the bloke (Sanders) because he’s thinking that he’s got a European champion on his hands when he hasn’t.

“The thing is, he hasn’t even got a British Boxing Board of Control licence anymore. Don’t get me wrong, it wouldn’t be hard for him to get one but these things take time and Jamie’s got a world title eliminator coming up.”

McDonnell has said that his training camp for the Malik Bouziane clash in Doncaster on March 10 is now getting underway and the confusion has not done any damage which will impact on his focus.