Wednesday 8 July 2015 16:38, UK
Scott Quigg has dismissed Carl Frampton's accusation that he is the reason their fight has not happened and believes his rival is trying to shift the blame.
Frampton, the IBF super-bantamweight world champion, has labelled the Bury fighter the "ultimate" obstacle to a proposed all-British unification fight.
The Northern Irishman also said Quigg "just over-valued himself" when it came to the initial negotiations and believes he himself is worth more than the original 60-40 split Matchroom offered.
But Quigg, the WBA title holder, believes it is an attempt to shift the blame and instead is now fully focused on producing the best performance of his career against Kiko Martinez on July 18, live on Sky Sports.
"It doesn't bother me but it shows he's (Frampton's) bothered," he told Toe2Toe.
"It doesn’t bother me in the slightest. They can say what they want but this is a way of shifting the blame because the fight is not happening between me and him.
There has been a lot of talk about a lot of big big fights but there is no bigger fight than against Kiko Martinez because none of these fights will happen if I don't get past him
"The fight's not happening because they don't want it to happen and that's final. We offered 60-40 to them straight up and if they are that confident he would win that fight, they would take it anyway.
"He never made me an offer but the fight is by-the-by now, they are just trying to shift the blame on why the fight won't happen."
Quigg says the fight with Frampton is still the biggest in the 122lbs division, despite talk of a showdown with Nonito Donaire.
He admits the Filipino four-weight world champion might be "more of a possibility" but is only interested in beating Martinez on his return to the ring after six months out.
And while Frampton beat the Spaniard on points to become a champion last summer, Quigg is not concerned about producing a better result.
"Again there has been a lot of talk about a lot of big, big fights but there is no bigger fight than against Kiko Martinez because none of these fights will happen if I don't get past him," he said.
"The main thing is to go out there and get the win. I want to put on the best performance of my career for myself, not to try and prove anything to anybody else.
"Every time I fight I want to get in there and put on a better performance than the last one because if I didn't something would be wrong in the gym and it would mean I am not improving.
"I want to improve, I go in the gym every day and I work hard to improve.
"I know what I can do. I don’t need to get in there and put in a better performance than Frampton, or whoever. I want to do it for myself and I am very confident I will do that."
Scott Quigg, Peter Fury, Ricky Burns and Jamie Moore are all on the latest Toe 2 Toe podcast. You can download it here.
