NEWBRIDGE'S Joe Calzaghe will get his showdown with undisputed world middleweight champion Bernard Hopkins before the end of the year, reckons promoter Frank Warren.

The WBO super-middleweight king has been frustrated at not landing the fight he has desired for a long time.

However, Warren has been negotiating with Hopkins' promoter Don King and now he believes the fight has more chance of happening following developments over the weekend.

King won the purse bids - which is understandable as he was the only person to bid - for Hopkins mandatory defence against William Joppy. That will cost King half-a-million dollars.

Hopkins stands to receive a US$375,000 purse and Joppy will receive US$125,000 but the cash may be too low for the reigning champion

Warren has previously offered both Hopkins and Joppy more money to face Calzaghe and they both now stand to receive considerably less by fighting each other.

As well as turning down the offer to fight Calzaghe, the self-managed Hopkins has also turned down lucrative showdowns against Roy Jones Jnr and more recently James Toney.

Warren said, "Hopkins is making more mistakes as a self-managed boxer than any other boxer I can think of in my time in the sport.

"Hopefully he can see the lucrative offer I have put forward to him to face Joe instead of defending his title for less money than Ricky Hatton gets for a world title defence."