Welsh boxer Nathan Cleverly has warned his rivals to fight him sooner rather than later because he is 'nowhere near his peak'.
Cleverly has claimed that Bernard Hopkins turned down an offer to fight him in November and WBA light-heavyweight champion Beibut Shumenov rejected a big-money fight in the United Kingdom.
However, while the 25-year-old insists that there is no rush to compete in big fights, he has warned his rivals that he is only going to become a better fighter.
Cleverly told BBC Sport Wales: "I'm still quite a long way off my prime. There's no rush into these big fights even though I would fight them now and we've tried to make these fights.
"I can take it as a positive because there's a reason why these fighters don't want to fight you and that's because I'm difficult to beat.
"I'm unbeaten and when I'm mentally focused 100% I'm going to be very, very difficult to beat."
The WBO light-heavyweight champion's next fight is against Ukrainian Vyacheslav Uzelkov in Cardiff on October 27.
Darren Plant
