{"id":711131,"date":"2026-06-02T21:01:14","date_gmt":"2026-06-02T21:01:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/711131\/"},"modified":"2026-06-02T21:01:14","modified_gmt":"2026-06-02T21:01:14","slug":"boxing-news-2026-george-burgess-reveals-rejected-barry-hall-fight-ahead-of-debut-vs-nelson-asofa-solomona","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/711131\/","title":{"rendered":"Boxing news 2026: George Burgess reveals rejected Barry Hall fight ahead of debut vs Nelson Asofa-Solomona"},"content":{"rendered":"

A rejected fight proposal to take on an AFL legend in the ring is driving George Burgess<\/a>\u2032 hunger as he prepares to face ex-Storm<\/a> star Nelson Asofa-Solomona<\/a> later this month.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The former Rabbitohs prop is just weeks away from making his debut in the ring against Asofa-Solomona, with the pair named part of the undercard for Liam Paro\u2019s IBF welterweight champion title fight against Lewis Crocker.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

George Burgess poses in preparation for his fight against Nelson Asofa-Solomona.\u00a0Bradley Kanaris<\/p>\n

Since the fight was confirmed last month, verbal barbs have been fired from both Burgess and Asofa-Solomona, who will enter the ring off the back of a knock-out victory over Jarrod Wallace in April<\/a>.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Burgess revealed Asofa-Solomona was not the first to offer him a bout in the ring, with AFL<\/a> great Barry Hall proposing a duel in 2019, before he ended up fighting<\/a> Sharks great Paul Gallen<\/a>.\u00a0<\/p>\n

While the offer to fight the Sydney Swans<\/a> champion came at the wrong time for Burgess, he admits that rejecting that opportunity still weighs on his mind.<\/p>\n

\u201cBoxing has always been, in my opinion, the hardest sport in the world to compete in,\u201d he told Fox Sports News on Tuesday.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cIf you get the opportunity to step in the boxing ring against a great opponent, I would never turn it down.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cI actually turned down a fight in 2019 with Barry Hall, and he ended up fighting Paul Gallen. They drew the fight, but I always regretted [turning it down] a little bit.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cI only had four weeks to prepare for that fight. This time I\u2019ve had longer, I\u2019ve had months to prepare. I\u2019ve been able to have a good trainer pay respect to what, I believe, is the hardest sport in the world.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"George<\/p>\n

George Burgess pushes Nelson Asofa-Solomona away during a face off.\u00a0Chris Hyde<\/p>\n

Burgess made clear that he is in no way just a \u201cfooty player trying to get his hand\u201d when it comes to facing Asofoa-Solomona, citing all the work he has done to \u201crespect\u201d the sport.<\/p>\n

Yet, even though he has done all the training, his looming opponent views him as \u201can actor\u201d – a label that is a cheeky jab at the career Burgess has been pursuing since hanging up the boots.\u00a0<\/p>\n

But there are things that Burgess has learned from pursuing the arts that he will be utilising when it comes time to put on the gloves.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cI just finished a movie called Beast \u2026and we got to shoot at a real fight in Thailand and experience what it means to be around fighters,\u201d he said.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cThat really gave me the juice for it. I think I\u2019ve got the bug for boxing because once you start delving into it properly, it is quite addictive.\u201d<\/p>\n

While Burgess is currently focused on his upcoming fight, he also has the excitement of featuring in another boxing movie later this year.<\/p>\n

And while his passion for being an actor may not make sense to Asofa-Solomona, Burgess recognised that there is no other fighter that he would rather face in his boxing debut.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\"Nelson<\/p>\n

Nelson Asofa-Solomona reacts after defeating Jarrod Wallace.\u00a0No Limit Boxing<\/p>\n

\u201cWe competed against each other for our countries, our clubs,\u201d the 34-year-old said.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s a great rivalry, and it\u2019s one that I think is going to be something that the fans are going to want to see in the ring.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cThere is going to be a quarter of a tonne in the ring, it\u2019s going to be fireworks. I can\u2019t wait.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m going to do some serious harm.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A rejected fight proposal to take on an AFL legend in the ring is driving George Burgess\u2032 hunger…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":711132,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[571],"tags":[64,63,802,85],"class_list":["post-711131","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-boxing","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-boxing","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/711131","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=711131"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/711131\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/711132"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=711131"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=711131"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=711131"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}