TROWBRIDGE'S British middleweight champion Nick Blackwell will defend his domestic belt in a long-awaited showdown with number one-ranked contender Chris Eubank Jnr next month.

The much-anticipated fight will take place at the SSE Arena at Wembley on March 26 and be screened live on Channel Five.

Blackwell, 25, won the title in May of last year with a seventh-round stoppage of John Ryder at a sold-out O2 Arena.

He subsequently defended it twice, knocking out Damon Jones in Derby and outpointing Jack Arnfield in Bristol, and would claim the belt outright with a third successful defence.

"I’d known that it was going to be happening since before Christmas and Mick had said to me ‘it’s going to happen, so make sure you’re ready’,” Blackwell told the Wiltshire Times.

"But things went quiet for a while and in the back of my mind I was thinking: ‘why haven’t I heard anything?’.

"I got a call from Mick last night to tell me all about this and I’m made up.

"I’ve got six weeks now and I’m going to be ready. I can’t wait for this fight. "

Former interim WBA world middleweight title-holder Eubank Jnr is likely to be the toughest test of his reign after recent stoppage wins over Gary 'Spike' O'Sullivan, Tony Jeter and Dmitry Chudinov, with a narrow points defeat to world champion Billy Joe Saunders in November 2014 his sole career loss.

MORE FROM NICK BLACKWELL AHEAD OF HIS SHOWDOWN WITH CHRIS EUBANK JR IN NEXT WEEK'S WILTSHIRE TIMES