Who is Vijender Singh's second pro boxing opponent, Dean Gillen?

Will Vijender make it 2 out of 2?

One unique way of looking at Vijender Singh’s second professional boxing bout, as World Boxing News puts it, is Fire vs Police. Vijender is a deputy superintendent with the Haryana Police while Dean Gillen is a long serving member of the Nottingham Fire and Rescue.

The disparity doesn’t end there – the 29-year-old Vijender is a three-time Olympian, having worn the tricolour to the 2004 Athens, 2008 Beijing and 2012 London Games. He clinched a bronze medal in the 2008 edition.

Vijender’s pedigree also has Commonwealth Games success, as he’s won a medal at every single edition of the event he’s taken part in – silver at Melbourne in 2006, bronze at Delhi in 2010 and silver at Glasgow in 2014.

In stark contrast, Gillen has a lone gold in the 2013 World Police and Firefighter Games in Belfast, Ireland, which he attained by knocking out all three of his adversaries. Obscure as the biennial event may seem, it draws nearly 10,000 participants, not far behind the Olympics.

Gillen, is a firefighter who boxes

Gillen has won both his fights since turning pro in May of this year. He won his first fight against fellow debutant Shaun White via decision and followed it up with another decision win over Lewis Van Poetsch. Both his fights were scored identically in his favour at 39-37.

Vijender’s celebrity is such that his debut on October 10^th was watched by an estimated 20 million people in India, which is probably a record television audience for a debut fight. The nation was jubilant after his third round technical knockout of Sonny Whiting.

Gillen had this to say about his match with the Indian star, “It’s going to be another win for them or so they think. Basically, I got offered a fight on the undercard of an English title fight against a debutant last Monday but their team didn’t fancy it, and then I got offered this on the Wednesday and it took all of two minutes to think about it before I accepted!”

Undaunted by Vijender’s stature, Gillen added, “I totally respect what he’s done and achieved, but ultimately there’ll be two men with gloves on, of equal weight, boxing to the same rules...I’m not kidding myself or anyone else, but that is genuinely the way I am looking at.”

Despite them being of equal weight, the Nottinghamshire fighter is an inch taller than Vijender at 6”1’ and has a two-inch reach advantage. Expectations of victory aside, people will be hoping for a more exciting fight as compared to the first one and one thing is assured – one of the two will taste defeat for the first time in their careers.