I'm pretty relaxed as I knock on the door to meet and interview heavyweight fighter and knock out specialist Roger Izonritei, that is, until the 6"5 frame of Big Roger finally comes to the front door. The first thing he says is " I thought you were going to ring me before you came over", and before I know it I am fumbling around for excuses as to why I didn't do "the follow up call" to finalise the interview time.

Nevertheless I am invited in, and before I have time to set up interviewing equipment, Roger begins a conversation about how a persons hands, no matter what their profession, are one's life. He goes onto to explain that to him, these are the most important tools he has, and must be protected. For him, besides for a fight, he is the only person that is allowed to wrap them.

From there the conversation skips between various fight related topics before I probe Roger for some background on his pugilist career, and he takes me back to Nigeria in 1998, where he was the national super heavyweight champion and certain to be selected for the soon to be Sydney Olympics in 2000.At the same time however, the Nigerian heavyweight champion was a familiar name, Samuel Peter.

"Man I beat everybody…In my first fight I was 19 and I knocked out cold Doncan Dokowari (former heavyweight contender). You know Samuel Peter? I used to beat the crap out of Samuel Peter in sparring" he says. Now known as the "Nigerian Nightmare", the undefeated Peter is arguably the most ferocious heavyweight in the game today, and is now preparing to fight Wladimir Klitschko for the WBO/IBF title eliminator, and more importantly, get his big payday.

Although they never fought in the amateurs, by his own admission Roger would beat Peter so badly in sparring that before a session commenced he would ask for Roger to take it easy on him. Despite this, the Nigerian coach took a liking to Peter and only months before the Sydney Olympic moved him up to take the super heavyweight position, without having to beat Roger for the spot. Roger did however, come to Australia as Peter's sparring partner, and with the political decisions within the Nigerian team seeming to work against him, decided to stay behind and pursue a his fighting career in Australia.

Roger has amassed and impressive record in his 5 year professional career (10-4-0 10KO's), dispatching several of Australia's best heavyweight prospects such as Nathan Briggs and King Kava in the process. An interesting thing to note is that none of his fights have ever gone the scheduled distance, and all his wins are by KO, making him a knock out or be knocked out fighter. Thankfully the latter, which on paper screams of being thrown in the deep end too early in his career, seems to be well behind him.

And this is no padded record either, with notable opponents such as Bob Mirovic, Colin Wilson and Peter Okhello being the only ones to hand Roger defeat. "They know I am a dangerous fighter so they always call me up late, hoping that I am unfit and they can take advantage of that" he shrugs.

"I'm often brought in as the underdog, but I am a man and I will stand up to anyone, I don't care who you are- that's just me. Sometimes being the underdog works for me, like in my fight against King Kava. He had so much pressure to win from the media and his sponsors, and he came out and was so aggressive. He was too worried about his punches and not what my hands were doing, so I knocked him out with my straight right hand. It was a nice punch, I felt it all the way up to my shoulder" he says contently.

With an active focus on moving his career into international territory, Roger's next bout was to be a defence of his IBF Pan Pacific title in Florida on the under card of a major PPV event, registering his biggest pay day to date. His opponent was perhaps the hottest prospect in the South Pacific region, New Zealand's Shane Cameron, who is managed by David Tua's old trainer Kevin Barry. With Cameron pulling out due to a reported groin injury I ask when the fight had been rescheduled for.

"They called me and said they didn't want the fight anymore, they know I am too dangerous" he says. So, in the meantime and until the next fight is scheduled, in order to look after his 3 year old daughter, Roger will continue to work in construction during the day and manning the door in some of Perth's most exclusive night spots by night.

" I am meant to be a professional", he chuckles. " And yet here I am working two jobs to make ends meet. So I like to think of it as semi professional". And for the man that used to whip the most ferocious heavyweight contender in the world regularly, that old saying "you just have to keep punching" seems fitting.

So, despite some ups and downs in his life, when I ask the current IBF Pan Pacific heavyweight champion to hold up his belt and pose for a photo, its nothing but pride I see gleaming through that big smile.