Last year, Britain's 3 best middleweights all fought for world titles, Matthew Macklin and Martin Murray fought for Felix Sturm's WBA Super version of the title and Darren Barker matched up against Sergio Martinez for the WBC Diamond and The Ring titles. While Darren Barker gave Martinez a good fight, he was outclassed by the Argentine Middleweight king. As for Macklin and Murray, both their outcomes can be debated, with them both putting on fight-winning performances only to see Sturm go home with his belt still around his waist.

So what I'm asking is whether the British middleweights do have the class to be world champions or whether they will forever be lingering in the gap between being to good for domestic and European glory but not quite there in terms of being top class, world level fighters?