TKV (9-2, 5 KOs) will defend his British heavyweight title against Richard Riakporhe (19-1, 15 KOs) on the undercard of Tyson Fury’s fight against Arslanbek Makhmudov. Netflix will screen the action.

TKV went to school across the road from the stadium and is a fan of the North London team that calls the 60,000-capacity venue home.

Tottenham is one of the giants of English football, but despite having a team full of international players, a horrendous season has left the Spurs in genuine danger of slipping out of the top flight for the first time in almost 50 years.

Tottenham’s solution has been to blame the coaching staff. The club recently appointed their third full-time manager of the season and must hope that Roberto Di Zerbi can motivate the players enough to stave off relegation.

As a professional boxer, TKV believes that – at some point – an athlete has to take responsibility for the own performance.

“The effort you put in is all on your own head. It’s like me making a mistake in a fight that my coach told me not to make and then blaming my coach,” he told The Ring. “We do see that in boxing in itself, which is why it's not a surprise to see it in football. People look for someone else to blame, and no one really takes accountability.

“But I think, at this point, athletes themselves should take accountability and make a difference.”

TKV showed plenty of accountability before and during his December victory over Frazer Clarke. A rib injury forced him to withdraw from the original date, and the 32-year-old had to battle through a host of issues to make the rescheduled British title fight.

TKV turned up, took his place in the away corner and set about dragging the Olympic bronze medalist into a fight. He hurt an exhausted Clarke repeatedly over the final rounds to seize a split decision victory.

“I understood that, ‘Look, I’m going to get into this fight. There’s no pulling out, especially second time. Whatever is wrong, you've got to deal with it and get on with the fight,’” he said.

“I got on with the fight and – by God’s grace – it worked out how it did. British champion. It's character building sometimes if there's a little bit of bumps on the road. It tests how tough you are, so I don't mind a few bumps, but smoothness is cool as well.”

Against Clarke, TKV displayed his toughness and his underrated ability to make opponents fight his kind of fight. But if he expected the career best victory to earn him anything other than a few pats on the back, he was sorely disappointed.

Much of the post-fight debate centered around the mistakes Clarke made rather than TKV’s determined performance and infighting ability.

“100 percent, I felt disrespected. I felt very disrespected,” TKV said. “People are not talking about me, they're talking about Frazer. ... No one spoke about me. No one realized that I'm the one that beat Frazer.

“Everyone was just dismissing my win, in a way.”

TKV has stopped worrying about the opinions of others, but if he can get past Riakporhe this weekend, a few more people may just begin to believe in him.

Although he is the established heavyweight and the reigning British champion, TKV once again finds himself a pre-fight underdog against the former cruiserweight world title challenger.

“He might not expect it to be easy but maybe the fans – I hear a few comments here and there – they probably expect it to be a quick little run-out for Richard. But I don't believe that will be the case,” he said.

“I’m like, ‘OK. No problem.’ It fuels me. It builds that hunger. It gets me excited when I see that. I start shadowboxing, doing push-ups. I'm using my knuckles on the ground.”