Awkward workplace relations behind Sonny Bill Willams-Paul Gallen beef

Sonny Bill Williams declared "I know I'm better than him" as the war of words with sparring partner Paul Gallen continued apace on Sunday.

Williams and Gallen have been trading verbal jabs for a decade and the trash talking will be settled once and for all in the ring on July 16 at Sydney's Qudos Bank Arena.

Williams joined Stan Sport's Champions League final post-game coverage after Paris Saint-Germain's record 5-0 victory and football host Adam Peacock asked what would happen if the pair crossed paths before the fight in their pundit duties.

Sonny Bill Willams vs Paul Gallen at Sydney's Qudos Bank Arena on July 16 is available to order live and exclusive on Stan Pay-Per-View for $70

"Yeah, I don't know. I've worked with him for the last couple of years on and off, and he's never really said anything," Williams said.

"So maybe if he looks at me the other way... if I can see him because I've got to crouch down to get to his eye level, I might give him a little one, you know. But I really don't know.

"It's all kind of come out last week when he didn't come to the press conference. It was quite upsetting because there was a few questions that I really wanted to ask him, you know.

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"And over the last 10 years, I haven't really spoken too much because I don't want to add fuel to any fire, unnecessarily. Now that we're gonna fight, that was kind of my time to actually speak some truths."

Williams quipped that Gallen might have skipped the presser to dodge drug testers, a none too subtle nod to the Cronulla Sharks peptides scandal that rocked the NRL.

The pair had to be separated after a 2022 NRL game on Nine's post-game panel chat by Immortal-in-waiting Cameron Smith.

Speaking to SEN Radio at the time, Smith said he was stunned by the clash.

"This was post-game and we were having a great post-game show, having a bit of fun," Smith said.

"And all of a sudden it went from reviewing the Warriors-Parramatta match to Sonny Bill Williams and Gal talking about why they haven't got a fight organised yet.

"They were getting stuck into each other. I was in between them, James Bracey was down the end hosting the show, and I had a bit of a chuckle at first but it kept going.

"Then I looked at Bracey and said 'is this a gee-up?' But they kept going for 10 minutes."

Williams is training on the Gold Coast with Jai Opetaia.

The New Zealander has youth and size on his side and the bookmakers have installed him as a slight favourite.

"I'm training hard because I wanna do the job, I wanna give him a good hiding to tell you the truth," the 39-year-old said.

"The learnings that I took from my last fight (a loss to Mark Hunt), one of them was you can't get in the ring friendly.

"You can't get in the ring thinking that this guy's gonna be your friend afterwards. And obviously, this fight, there's a lot of animosity between us, a lot of history between us, so that's easy.

"Jai Opetaia... he's got that killer mentality. And he kind of reminds me of when I was in my peak playing footy, so that's the mindset that I want to take into this fight.

"And at the end of the day, I know I'm better than him. I've just gotta train my arse off so I can get in there and give him a good hiding."