The belief for years was that Chantelle Cameron was a pound-for-pound star in the making.
Her past two wins have rapidly advanced the unbeaten Englishwoman near the top of a very short list of the sport’s very best fighters in the world. At the very least, she is undoubtedly the best 140-pound fighter on the planet.
A firm reminder was delivered in her ten-round win over the legendary Katie Taylor this past weekend on the road at 3Arena in Dublin, Ireland. Cameron successfully defended her undisputed junior welterweight championship six months after having earned that status with a well-earned victory over then-fully unified welterweight queen Jessica McCaskill, who dropped back down in weight for their ten-round battle last November 5 in Abu Dhabi.
“In my last fight, I beat McCaskill. I defended my belts again against Katie Taylor,” Cameron pointed out during her in-ring DAZN post-fight interview. “I just beat two undisputed champions.”
In both instances, McCaskill and Taylor fell short of becoming two-division undisputed champions—a status Cameron (18-0, 8KOs) next craves.
“I’ll speak to my team and see what’s next but I’m sick of keeping my belts,” noted Cameron. “I want to go for some more belts.”
Cameron made the fifth overall defense of at least one junior welterweight title dating back to her October 2020 WBC title win over unbeaten Adrian Dos Santos Araujo, who vacated the belt at the scales after missing weight by more than five pounds. She added the IBF strap with a ten-round win over Mary McGee in their October 2021 unification bout, then the vacant WBA and WBO titles in her win over McCaskill last November.
An unexpected superfight emerged for the 32-year-old from Northampton, England when Taylor (22-1, 6KOs) was in need of an opponent for her scheduled and long overdue May 20 homecoming. The Olympic Gold medalist, two-division and reigning undisputed lightweight champion was due to have a rematch versus Amanda Serrano, who was forced to withdraw due to a prior injury that never fully healed in time to proceed.
Cameron leaped at the opportunity, well aware of facing a partisan crowd heavily in favor of one of Ireland’s most celebrated sports icons.
“It was unbelievable. I’m just unlucky they weren’t for me,” noted Cameron, who exhibited nerves of steel throughout the week and especially in the ring. “But Katie’s got a great following. It’s a great country for boxing. We had a good fight week even though I was the underdog and got a lot of boos.
“But I showed I’m a proper fighter. I brought my belts here, I put my belts up against the pound for pound best and came out on top.”
Preliminary plans call for a Cameron-Taylor rematch to take place later this year, as Taylor already informed Matchroom Boxing’s Eddie Hearn—who promotes both fighters—of her burning desire to run it back.
Jake Donovan is a senior writer for BoxingScene.com. Twitter: @JakeNDaBox