KEY POINTS:
What's for certain when Shane Cameron steps in the ring from now on is that opponents will target his eyebrows and try and open him up.
What's uncertain is how well Cameron's facial skin will hold up against a sustained barrage of punches to one area of the
head.
He's only lost the one fight from 20 and even then he was ahead on the judges' cards. But the 12th round TKO to Friday Ahunanya in November showed the boxing world that Cameron cuts and bleeds.
He finished that fight unable to see clearly for the bloodied sweat pouring into his eyes and was unusually knocked down twice. Cameron and his new trainer, Osvaldo Antonio Garcia, and manager Ken Reinsfield have taken several measures to deal with the problem. He's had surgery to remove hardened scar tissue built up over the seven years of his pro career, tissue that cuts easily, and the skin around the eyes has been tightened.
In training he has been moving more, refining his footwork, and he's adjusted his style somewhat.
Not that Cameron won't be coming forward, taking the fight to his next opponent, Jonathan Haggler, when they meet at Auckland's Sky City Convention Centre next Friday.
"I'm moving better, I've done a lot of work on the defensive side of things but one thing in boxing that's guaranteed is that you're going to get hit in the head," he said ahead of training in Auckland this week. "My style will change a bit, maybe not so much the aggressor. The punching ability is still there - it's a matter of making my punches count more."
Cameron, 30, was 19 wins with 17 KOs, two regional title belts in the bag and well on his way to the big time he seeks in the United States or Europe when Ahunanya stymied him.
His marketability remains good overseas though, his punching power and take-it-to-them approach respected. "It's not like he was losing or got beaten up," Reinsfield said. "It was a disappointing loss but not a disappointing fight."
This next one has good corporate support already - "everyone who was there last time is back again." The WBO Oriental and Asia Pacific belts on offer would restore some status.
There may be just this fight, one in Wellington in June and another in Christchurch mid-August before he pursues that overseas dream.
Haggler, 35, an Afro-American from Winston-Salem in North Carolina, is 1.89m tall to Cameron's 1.87m and has a reach of 1.81m to Cameron's 1.79m. He's a southpaw but the Gisborne-bred "Mountain Warrior" has disposed of two of those already and asserts he has no trouble coping with the lefty style.
Cameron has been sparring with American Ed Mahone, who fights on the undercard. Garcia, from Puerto Rico, has him aiming to fight smarter, with more patience, pacing himself, looking for more attack angles and using his right more.
"You'll see everything I've done in the past, hopefully more accuracy, more movement and setting myself for the next one a bit better. I'm ring-fit, it's coming together well." You pick up different things from different trainers, he agrees. This will be Cameron's seventh 12-round bout and he's comfortable with that.
