Tony Bellew has had a pretty sensational 18 months in the boxing ring.

'The Bomber' won the WBC Cruiserweight title at his beloved Goodison Park, the home of Everton, with a brutal third-round knockout of Ilunga Makabu, having picked himself up off the canvas in round one.

He then recorded another TKO win against BJ Flores last October to defend his world title, before famously stopping David Haye in a heavyweight bout at the O2 Arena when barely anyone gave him a chance.

Bellew is currently preparing to step back into the ring with Haye at the same venue in December, with the eagerly anticipated rematch set to give the Liverpudlian the chance to end the career of the 'Hayemaker'.

He's already spoken about the possibility of a title fight at heavyweight level against either Deontay Wilder or Joseph Parker, but has no plans to fight Anthony Joshua, who is a close friend.

However, there is another top-weight fighter who would like to meet Bellew in the ring.

DIllian Whyte, fresh after his unanimous decision victory over Robert Helenius last week, called 'Bomber' out on talkSPORT in an interview with Alan Brazil.

Whyte was responding to Bellew's claim that he was not a top-level fighter, and the Liverpudlian has ruled out any possibility of a bout with the Brixton man in 2018.

'The Body Snatcher' claimed he has offered to fight Bellew for free a number of times, and called him a 'coward'.

"Tony Bellew is a very bitter man and he is a coward," he said. "I have offered to fight Tony Bellew for free on numerous occasions.

"This is a man that was getting knocked out at super-middleweight and at light-heavyweight. He is not a true heavyweight.

"Tony Bellew is scared to fight me, he is scared to fight Anthony Joshua, he is scared to fight Deontay Wilder. I am not scared to fight any of these guys. That is the reason why he feels he needs to bad-mouth me.

"If he is a real man, let him fight me. I want to fight him and beat up him just to show him he is not a true heavyweight. He will get smashed."

Bellew responded in typical fashion on Twitter, and told Whyte he won't ever achieve as much as he has.

With Bellew currently awaiting a response from Whyte, it doesn't seem that the war of words between the pair will be cooling down any time soon.

And now the bad blood between the pair is common knowledge, Eddie Hearn may have a very easy fight to sell next year...