Paul Gallen has sensationally walked out of his pre-fight press conference, saying he didn’t want to promote opponent Kris Terzievksi for one more second.
Speaking at The Star ahead of Wednesday’s card, Gallen said he was delighted to be promoting such a high-quality card, but again fumed at a perceived lack of effort from his opponent to do the same.
“This is the best card I’ve ever been a part of, so to headline this act and put you guys on show means a hell of a lot to me,” Gallen said before taking aim at his opponent again.
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“Kris has done nothing to sell this fight, nothing. Not one thing. There was more media at the media day the other day than the NRL grand final – didn’t turn up to it, didn’t fit his schedule.
“So I’m not going to sit here for one more minute and f—ing promote him,” Gallen said before standing up and crossing the stage to lean over Terzievski.
“You’re a pretty boxer, but Wednesday’s not going to be pretty. It’s going to be ugly, it’s going to be a street fight – and I’m gonna bash you,” he said before walking out.
It was Gallen’s first chance to speak at the event, which was then abruptly cut short.
Terzievski seemed amused at the antics, saying “good onya Paul, that was real staunch mate,” he said as the Sharks legend left the building.
The pair will see each other again at the weigh-in, before fighting for the Australian and Australasian titles on Wednesday.
“That was a bit out of character for him,” Terzievski told reporters afterwards.
“He was saying he was in my head, but maybe I’m potentially in his – who knows?”
In response to the criticisms regarding promotion, the Victorian said he was just riding the wave of being in the spotlight of a big fight card, and was still learning that side of the sport.
“Don’t take kindness for weakness,” he warned.
“I don’t feel I have to discredit everyone and like I said, I have no feelings towards him, good or bad. I hope we both end up safe at the end of the fight but I’ll be looking to inflict as much damage as I can.”
Terzievski also defended his no-show at the Bondi Boxing Club in Waterloo last week, saying that he was initially told that there would be pre-fight media obligations in Melbourne, where he was training for the fight.
“I was under the understanding of that, and all of a sudden I got a call saying there’s been a change of plans – and for me, this is the biggest fight of my career,” he said.
“When they changed it up on me I said ‘I can’t make the morning, I’ve got commitments’ but I still came down that day and did interviews and what not. He just said what he wanted to say, but it wasn’t really how it was supposed to be.”
The 32-year-old said that ultimately this part of the build-up had just been a massive storm in a teacup.
“It’s a bit overblown, a bit of gamesmanship potentially, something that he needs to pump himself up for. But it was just a logistics thing.”
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