IT would seem like the niceties and mutual respect between myself and Roy Jones Jr are coming to an end, three-and-a-bit weeks before the final fight of my career. Thank goodness for that!

I wondered how long it would be until Jones started running me down and dismissing my achievements and he started doing it this week.

He has said I am merely a good European fighter and that there are too many question marks about my career for me to be considered great.

He also said that after studying tapes of me, he sees no possible way that I can beat him.

Interesting! I laughed when I heard what he said.

These American fighters seem to think that calling someone a good European fighter is an insult.

Frankly, I think being a good or great European fighter in 2008 means a damn sight more than being big news in America, because boxing in the States is particularly weak at the moment.

I do respect Roy Jones, but as far as I am concerned, he is yesterday and I am today, he was great and I am great. I will prove that to be the case on November 8 at Madison Square Garden, a venue I have dreamed of fighting in for the past 25 years.

Roy can talk about me not being a legend, but I wouldn’t swap my 45-0 record for his, bearing in mind he has been knocked out twice.

I intend to put on the best show of my career in New York and that means stopping Jones. He has vastly underestimated my power.

I have been sparring this week and I am not just saying this, my hand has been spot-on and I am hitting hard.

Enzo Maccarinelli has been the dream sparring partner for me because he’s in the shape of his life for a fight that doesn’t seem to be on the horizon. But he’s trained hard for four months and is in frightening shape, so he’s been perfect and he says I am hitting harder than in the build-up to the Bernard Hopkins or Peter Manfredo fights.

Anyway, you can judge that for yourself soon enough as HBO have been filming me all week for their 24/7 programme.

But back to Roy, who also says he’s taken heart from the way I fought against Hopkins. Well I hope he has. That was a rotten performance from me and I still beat him on his own turf, despite him using every trick in the book to try and disrupt the fight.

Speaking of old man Hopkins, I will be watching his fight late tomorrow night against Kelly Pavlik with great interest.

It’s such a difficult fight to call, but I know columnists aren’t supposed to sit on the fence so here is my prediction.

I believe Kelly Pavlik will win a narrow points decision.

As far as I am concerned the key is age and nothing more, I give Pavlik the edge because I think there are absolutely huge question marks over the stamina of Hopkins.

Pavlik is a one-dimensional kind of a puncher and even though he has great power for a middleweight, I don’t believe he has the power or the ring smarts to stop Hopkins.

I think Hopkins might even rough him up a bit early on, but in the later rounds Pavlik should have enough in the tank to battle through because no-one would question that he has terrific heart.

I felt I was on the verge of stopping Hopkins in round ten of our fight, before he managed to buy himself a breather for a few minutes by claiming for a low blow that never happened.

That kind of tactic is bound to happen again on Saturday and Pavlik must make sure he deals with it.

I want to congratulate Gwent’s own Nathan Cleverly who became the Commonwealth champion at light heavyweight on Friday night by beating Tony Oakey. The fight went rather like I thought it would and Nathan deserves great credit for boxing so maturely.

He mixed it with Oakey for seven rounds and was only just ahead, but in the later rounds he started to move his feet more, got behind the jab and showed the fast hands that he learned to use so well in our gym.

It was an excellent performance from a 21-year old and I was so pleased for him. He might not still be part of Team Calzaghe because of boxing politics, but he’s a good mate and I wish him all the success in the world; although I think he could be really suited to my former division of super middleweight down the line as he doesn’t struggle with his weight and is naturally athletic.

Finally I just want to plug my newly revamped official website, www.calzaghe.com The hope is that it will be a lot more interesting now and it includes all the details of the Jones fight, including how to get tickets, which are still available.

There is also going to be a lot of stuff on there in conjunction with the Argus, so keep your eyes peeled!