Best British Fighters Of All Time In Each Weightclass

I'd have Freddie Welsh over Ken Buchanan at Lightweight, and Jim Driscoll over Naseem Hamed at Featherweight.

 

Bob Fitzsimons poses an interesting problem.

You could make a case for him being the GOAT at middle and light heavy, and he was frankly the GOAT at heavy until Lewis came along.

 

Owen Moran also complicates the argument a bit.

 

I will throw Joe Bowker into the argument.

 

It's a toss up between Moran and Driscoll at feather imo. Moran might be the best bantam too depending on how you look at the old weight limit. I'd rate them both over Naz, though that might not be a popular opinion per se. I wouldn't say that Naz ranks clearly over Winstone tbh, nor McGuigan. His era was very favourable compared to theirs, Winstone especially.

Rudkin might have a shout at bantam too depending on how you view Moran.

Welsh is greater than Buchanan quite clearly, outstanding though the latter was.

I don't think there's a huge amount between Conteh and Harvey or Turpin and Minter.

 

Off the top of my head, I agree with all, except where stated below:

MW = Bob Fitzsimmons
LWW = Ricky Hatton (JKB had the better overall career at all weights, imo, but if fights contested only at LWW count than it's Hatton for me)
LW = Freddie Welsh
SFW = Assuming Johnny Dundee & Cornelius Boza Edwards don't count as British, I can't think of a British fighter with a better record at SFW than Joe Cordina
FW = Jim Driscoll
SBW = Carl Frampton
BW = Jimmy Wilde (he holds wins over top 10 all time BW Philadelphia Pal Moore & top 15 all time Joe Lynch, as well as a few other decent BWs like Alf Mansfield), if you don't want to include any fighter at more than one weight, than Alan Rudkin would get my vote
S.Fly = I can't think of a British fighter who has done more at the weight than Khalid Yafai with his 6 x wins in WBA title fights. Sunny Edwards title fights have all been at Fly. Arguably Owen Moran, but difficult to tell which contests were officially in the Super Fly division

 

I forgot about Wilde being over the limit for Moore and Lynch quite bizarrely. Ouch. Yeah, that changes things.

 

Harvey L-HW
McAvoy MW
Roderick WW

Bowker FW
Jim Brady BW

H2H Greats!!!

 

Wilde was very much within the Fly limit for both, in fact he was in the modern day light fly limit vs Moore and modern day Minimumweight limit vs Lynch, but both fights were contested at BW due to the weight of his opponent.

Therefore, by my reckoning, as fights contested at BW, they contribute to Wilde's BW resume.

 

HW - lennox lewis
CW - johnny nelson (often forgotten but spent a long time at the top of the weight)
LHW - john conteh
SMW - joe calzaghe
MW - bob fitzommons
SWW - maurice hope
WW - ted kid lewis
SLW - jack kid berg
LW - freddie welsh
SFW - might be joe cordina
FW - naseem hamed
SBW - carl frampton
BW - duke mckenzie
SFlyW - khalid yafai
FlyW - jommy wild (wild clearly takes it but there are so many great british flyweights)
JFlyW - paul weir
MinW - no idea
shout out to owen moran who was my runner up at both FW and LW

 

Great post IT!!

 

But my favorite on the thread is the great John Conteh.

 

Paul Hodkinson. I like Junior Witter too.
Of the ones I've watched in my lifetime, Ricky Hatton.

Edit - I read the thread as being "your favorite british"