Former British and Commonwealth welterweight champion, Ekow Essuman, spent years routinely turning away younger, determined fighters one after the other.

A seven year long unbeaten run earned the 35 year-old from Nottingham plenty of respect within the sport but Essuman never received the accolades his success deserved.

He only really broke through with a wider audience last year after surviving two breathtaking wars with unbeaten pair, Owen Cooper and Ben Vaughan.

In July, he got up off the floor to dramatically stop Cooper in the final round of an exciting give and take battle and followed it up by outlasting the relentless Vaughan over ten brutal rounds.

Finally, Essuman, 21-1 (8 KOs), has been rewarded for his efforts and has the chance to break into the big time.

He has been selected as the man to welcome Edinburgh’s former undisputed junior welterweight champion, Josh Taylor, 19-2 (13 KOs), to the 147lb division. The former Team GB amateur teammates will meet at Glasgow’s SSE Hydro Arena on May 24th. DAZN will provide worldwide coverage of Taylor’s Queensberry Promotions debut.

At Thursday’s launch press conference, ’The Tartan Tornado’ doubled down on his belief that, at his best, he is more than capable of outboxing or outfighting Essuman.

Previously known as ‘The Engine’ because of his prodigious workrate, Essuman renamed himself ‘The Spectre’ after displaying supernatural powers of recovery to beat Cooper last year. He is quite willing to go to those deep, dark places again if Taylor does declare war once the first bell rings.

“He was a former undisputed champion, he’s got a lot of layers to him so he can try it,” he said.

“It is what it is. We’re in for an exciting fight. We’re both similar in that respect. We both come forward, we’re both very aggressive. He’s a good counterpuncher, people don’t know that I’m adept at counter punching but it’s the perfect stage to show the other things I can do and to what level as well.

“I've been crying out for it for a while now, to just break out of that little pond that I was fighting in. And yeah, I’m hella excited for it.

“Former undisputed champion, it's a nice big step up and it's good to be here on the top table.”

Essuman made four defences of his British and Commonwealth welterweight titles before coming unstuck at the hands of ‘Horrible’ Harry Scarff in November 2023. Rather than the first defeat of his career showing Essuman’s ceiling or limitations, it felt more like a case of an experienced fighter going stale after spending too long grinding away at the same level.

He will need to up his game considerably if he is to get past Taylor but although the opportunity he has craved has arrived late in his career, Essuman is delighted to finally have the chance to prove that he is more than just a workhorse.

“Yeah, it’s the perfect fight for Ekow Essuman,” he said.

“You'll see flickers of ‘The Engine’ and flickers of ‘The Spectre.’ You'll see different sides to me and that's exactly why I wanted these big fights. People's just thinking, ‘Oh, he's just got that good engine, he's just got this and that’ but they've slept on a few different sides to me.”