{"id":861142,"date":"2026-08-19T19:20:10","date_gmt":"2026-08-19T19:20:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/861142\/"},"modified":"2026-08-19T19:20:10","modified_gmt":"2026-08-19T19:20:10","slug":"smith-vs-puello-british-world-champion-eyes-homecoming-fight-in-hillsborough-next-year","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/861142\/","title":{"rendered":"Smith vs Puello: British world champion eyes homecoming fight in Hillsborough next year"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">He refused to get carried away with the prospect of walking out at Hillsborough, but Matchroom chief executive Frank Smith believes the dream could soon become reality.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">&#8220;He&#8217;s not looking past this. It&#8217;s a proper fight,&#8221; he said. &#8220;But after this unification fights are there and the big night in Hillsborough is there.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">Puello, 32, held the WBA title from 2022 to 2023 before becoming WBC champion in 2024. He lost that belt to Matias in July 2025, the only defeat on his 26-fight professional record.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">&#8220;He wants to do to me what I did to Matias but believe me, that&#8217;s not going to happen,&#8221; Smith said. &#8220;Me fighting in my home town with the support behind me as a world champion, it gives me that extra fire.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">Speaking through a translator, the confident Dominican made it clear he intends to spoil Smith&#8217;s homecoming.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">&#8220;I don&#8217;t see many weaknesses in him but it will be hugely satisfying to come here to his hometown to rip his belt,&#8221; he said.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">&#8220;It will be really satisfying for me and a humiliation for him.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">An otherwise low-key media-only event ended with the two fighters shaking hands.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"He refused to get carried away with the prospect of walking out at Hillsborough, but Matchroom chief executive&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":861143,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[571],"tags":[64,63,802,85],"class_list":["post-861142","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\/861142","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=861142"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/861142\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/861143"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=861142"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=861142"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=861142"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}