Ricky Reeves eyes Sheffield showdown with Sheldon McDonald
Sheffield's Ricky Reeves is returning, with a warm-up fight set to take place next month
Sheffield's Ricky Reeves is back - and he has plans to disrupt the city's boxing hierarchy.
The cruiserweight is returning to the sport for the first time since winning the Central Area belt in April 2023.
He is due to fight a journeyman at Sheffield's Old Forge on September 26.
And then he hopes to challenge Manor Boxing Academy fighter Sheldon McDonald, who currently has the Central belt.
His ambitions represent a huge change in outlook since he beat fellow Sheffielder Perry Howe at the Magna Centre, Rotherham, three years ago.
He was happy to have won the belt, but hugely disappointed with his own performance, Reeves told Steve Dakin in "The View from the Corner" podcast.
It had been a dip in performance levels compared with a televised defeat on a Boxxer show in 2022.
That, and a hand injury and family issues, led him to retire.
"If your head is not in it 100 per cent, you can get hurt," he reasoned.
Having reached the age of 35, though, and signing for Rob Riley and his Hillsborough team, he has regained the hunger.
"I want to come back and give it everything this time. There are still big fights out there I can have and there are still titles I can win...I'll give it one last hurrah," he said.
A warm-up fight, probably against Ryan Labourn, will be staged next month at the Old Forge.
Reeves stopped McDonald in Manchester in a three-rounder with a right hook in 2022 and fancies another go.
"I think he has got an English title fight, so hopefully he wins it and I can take that off him!"
Dakin noted that McDonald had "come a long way" in the four years since that short-format loss, which is the only blemish on his CV.
Reeves said: "I know for a fact he'd want it (rematch.) We spoke not so long ago."
It would be a big Sheffield fight, he added.
Basegreen's Ricky, who has two children and one on the way, said things were going really well with the Riley organisation saying it is: "like a big family community."