Arthur highlights the great divide

After the packed press benches in Las Vegas, last weekend, it will be interesting to see how many of the English national boxing media join me ringside at the Meadowbank Arena in Edinburgh on Saturday night when Alex Arthur makes the first defence of his interim WBO super-featherweight title against Stephen Foster Jr.

My guess is not many. In the defence of some of the tabloids, the Scottish newspapers to tend to be completely different in their content, so are likely to have Scottish reporters present, but therein lies the problem. How to make Arthur appeal south of the border?

The last world champion from Edinburgh, the great Ken Buchanan, never defended a professional title in Scotland. During Buchanan's career, Scottish boxing was in a bit of a wasteland. He won the WBA lightweight title when the British Boxing Board of Control did not recognise the WBA, so he had to defend it abroad, while his only 'home' fights during his reign were non-title bouts at Wembley. Even his famous clash with Jim Watt took place in front of an all-male dinner crowd at the St Andrews Sporting Club.

But while Buchanan seemed to lack a profile in Scotland, Arthur lacks one beyond it. After he won the interim WBO super-featherweight title by beating Koba Gogoladze in Cardiff in July, I asked Alex if he considered himself a Scottish or a British champion. "Scottish," he said. "But if the rest of Britain wants to support me too, that's fine." But getting exposure south of the border - beyond The Times which is the best boxing paper anyway - has not proved easy.

Unfortunately, Arthur seems to have further problems in that, from a boxing point of view, he is on the wrong side of the Glasgow-Edinburgh rivalry. When he boxed at Kelvin Hall last year, the place was mostly empty, while Edinburgh, a city Arthur describes as "the world's biggest village"  seems none too keen to get behind one of their own when they get successful.

Arthur is a really good boxer, a big puncher, good-looking, a good talker and a nice guy - although he can get a bit touchy if you press him on his ever-changing training set-up.  It should be a winning combination and if ITV pick their ideas up and invest in boxing beyond bouts featuring Amir Khan, he could be one of the names to pick up the baton from Joe Calzaghe and Ricky Hatton over the next year.

Unfortunately, Saturday's bout, which will be shown on Setanta Sports, is a bit of a lose-lose situation. I struggle to see what Foster has done to earn a shot at Arthur. His best win was a points victory over John SImpson, another Scot, who is British featherweight champion but has improved since their meeting 20 months ago. Livinson Ruiz, the Colombian he beat to win the ever-vacant WBU title, has won just two in nine since their bout, which rather shows he was never all that. Foster has never boxed at super-featherweight and his comprehensive loss to Derry Mathews showed him as limited.

Indeed he seemed to go backwards when Khan joined him at Oliver Harrison's gym two or so years ago. He finally left to join Maurice Core but will have to have improved beyond all recognition to be a threat to Arthur, who has benefited from the more serious challenges provided at European title level than going down the hapless WBU route.

But if Arthur wins, people will say 'so what?' If Foster wins, he will not get the credit he deserves because it will be put down as a poor Arthur performance. Whoever the winner is - and presuming that Joan Guzman, the real WBO champion, will decline to face either - they need a serious name next up to draw themselves to the attentions of the boxing audience, at home and abroad. With boxing on a high, there isn't a better opportunity to become a star.

On the subject of last week, being a big fight in Vegas, several writers who will be back on football duty this weekend made the trip. Just before the post-bout press conference, a crowd of reporters gathered around Sugar Ray Leonard to garner his opinion on Floyd Mayweather Jr. It was then that one, with dictaphone pressed towards Leonard, turned to a British colleague and said "who's that?"

Not recognising old fighters is not a crime, but the Sugar Ray Leonard of 2007 still looks exactly like Sugar Ray Leonard.