Category: Boxing

• Boxer spent two nights in hospital after points victory
• Potential fight with Saul ‘Canelo’ Álvarez mentioned

Chris Eubank Jr says he underwent surgery after his gruelling points victory over bitter rival Conor Benn after being “head-butted”.

Eubank Jr spent two nights in hospital after his victory at the Tottenham Hotspur Stadium on Saturday evening, with his promoter Ben Shalom rejecting Benn’s claims the 35-year-old had suffered a broken jaw. Shalom said Eubank Jr had gone to hospital for “precautionary checks”, but the fighter has now revealed he had surgery on a damaged eye.

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• Heavyweights due to meet at Wembley on 19 July
• ‘If you’ve got power on your side, you can do anything’

Daniel Dubois has warned Oleksandr Usyk that none of the mind games will matter when they step into the ring for their heavyweight title ­unification contest and suggested the Ukrainian would simply not be able to “handle the pain” when they meet at Wembley on 19 July.

On Tuesday afternoon, Dubois and Usyk presented a compelling study in contrast as, in separate conversations to officially launch the fight, the two men ­echoed the differences between them that had already been made plain 24 hours earlier.

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Turki al-Sheikh had booked a second date before Saturday’s dramatic slugfest although loser’s promoter fears for fighter

“I want my revenge, man,” Conor Benn said quietly in the early hours of Sunday morning as his bruised face reflected his emotional pain after he lost against Chris Eubank Jr in a wild brawl at the Tottenham Hotspur Stadium. “I want my revenge.”

Those typical boxing words echoed the misguided clamour for a rematch with Eubank Jr. Eddie Hearn admitted that he would prefer Benn to move back down two divisions to welterweight but the promoter grinned helplessly: “The public, His Excellency, everybody’s going to want the rematch.”

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• Rematch on 19 July will unite heavyweight belts
• Briton lost controversially to Ukrainian in 2023

Daniel Dubois has revenge on his mind after landing a heavyweight unification bout against Oleksandr Usyk at Wembley Stadium on 19 July. The British fighter, who holds the IBF belt, has been angling for a rematch against the WBA, WBO and WBC champion, who stopped him in the ninth round of their previous meeting in August 2023.

Now the pair have agreed to a sequel at the national stadium and will meet face-to-face at a press conference on Tuesday. Dubois’ camp, led by promoter Frank Warren, were unhappy about the circumstances of the 27-year-old’s previous defeat in Poland. Referee Luis Pabon ruled that a fifth-round knockdown of Usyk was a low blow, allowing him a lengthy recovery period, and his call was strongly contested in the aftermath.

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All three judges score the fight 116-112 to Eubank Jr after a brutal and gruelling contest

Anthony Yarde has won a close but uncontroversial unanimous verdict over Lyndon Arthur in the final undercard bout. The judges’ scores were 115-113 and 116-112 (twice). It’s Sweet Caroline time in North London. We should be seeing Eubank Jr and Benn making their entrances shortly.

The Tottenham Stadium looks almost full as the main undercard fight between Anthony Yarde and Lyndon Arthur reaches the halfway stage. This is a 60,000-plus crowd that currently seems more enthused by the musical breaks than the boxing. I am not sure too many were watching closely, but they missed young Aaron McKenna utterly dominate a proud old fighter in Liam Smith. McKenna calls himself ‘The Silencer’ and I’ve followed him closely for a few years and been with him in dressing rooms before fights. I always knew he was good; but tonight he was outstanding as he won a near shutout victory and knocked Smith down in the last round. He has moved up to a significant level – not that the Tottenham crowd cared much. They will only really start making noise once the undercard is over.

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Without their fathers’ surnames there is zero chance the mismatched catchweight contest would take place

Back in his pomp as an era-defining, generational dog-torturer, the great Russian scientist Ivan Pavlov did an interesting experiment with shapes. This involved showing a dog called Vampire a combination of circles and ovals. Circles meant he was about to be fed. Ovals meant no food and possibly, maybe, at a push, being electrocuted.

Before long Vampire was showing the familiar conditioned response, salivating when he saw a circle, shying away from the oval. At which point Pavlov began to show him shapes that were weirdly pitched between the two, not quite an oval, not quite a circle, half a food promise, half something else, until eventually Vampire snapped, yelping and running around in circles, unable to interpret the truth of the thing in front of him. So, top work there everyone. Another dog successfully confused.

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Age, weight and whispers have raised doubts over who might triumph on Saturday but once the sound and fury fade we will be left with nothing to show for it

Ben Shalom and Eddie Hearn usually do not like each other but on Thursday evening, at the final press conference for the troubling bout between Chris Eubank Jr and Conor Benn, the promoters were almost breathless in their audacity and unity as they hailed a gift from the boxing heavens.

Shalom, Eubank Jr’s promoter, lauded “the biggest British boxing story ever”, “a monumental event” and “an unbelievable show” which has been “35 years in the making” as he suggested that Saturday night’s showdown completes the trilogy between two families – after the fighters’ fathers, Chris Eubank Sr and Nigel Benn, shared a couple of seismic bouts in the early 1990s. Hearn, who promotes Benn, spoke of “a fight for the generations … an iconic main event … an incredible time for boxing” and urged us to “remember this night … this is what it’s all about.”

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• Fight with Conor Benn still goes ahead on Saturday night
• Pair allowed to add more than 10lb in rehydration clause

The controversial and dangerous issue of weight cuts surrounding Saturday night’s fight between Chris Eubank Jr and Conor Benn has intensified after the former missed two attempts to make the 160lb middleweight limit on Friday morning. The 35-year-old Eubank initially scaled 160.2lb and then, after he tried for a second time, 160lb 0.8oz.

That marginal amount of 0.8oz will not force a cancellation of the bout but Eubank Jr has been fined $500,000 (£375,000) for failing to make the stipulated weight.

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In a circus-like press conference, Eubank Jr goads his rival while Benn threatens to ‘take his head off’

The latest saga in the endless hyping of a bout that should not be happening unfolded in a pantomime atmosphere at the Tottenham Hotspur Stadium on Thursday evening when Chris Eubank Jr and Conor Benn held their final press conference. Eubank Jr would not allow Eddie Hearn, Benn’s promoter, to talk as he constantly interrupted him and pointed out that people wanted to hear from the fighters rather than their salesmen.

It presented an easy victory for Eubank as the normally garrulous Hearn soon retreated from the stage and asked his CEO at Matchroom Boxing, Frank Smith, to take over. Smith is in a relationship with Eubank Jr’s sister, Emily, but his attempts to thank various people were not much more successful.

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British boxer discusses the horrors of making weight and strained relations with his dad before Saturday’s grudge match with Conor Benn

Chris Eubank Jr sits in his hotel room, locked in the extremes of a savage weight cut. Boiling down in weight gets even harder at the age of 35 but the words still flow freely. Eubank Jr can produce intelligent insights as easily as he churns out typical bombast and so he has no difficulty in explaining why his fight on Saturday night with Conor Benn will darken the British sporting landscape this week.

They were first meant to fight in October 2022, when a manufactured scrap was built on the enmity between their fathers, Chris Eubank Sr and Nigel Benn, in the 1990s. Separated by two weight divisions, the sons were brought together in a dubious catchweight contest while banging on about family feuds and legacies.

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Australian Diana Prazak was told she wouldn’t make it as a boxer. She’s just been inducted into the International Women’s Boxing Hall of Fame

The soft early evening spring light floods the room behind the world champion you’ve probably never heard of. In front of a big poster of a shirtless Bruce Lee adorning her wall, Diana Prazak smiles and laughs often as she talks about her most unlikely career and her road to the top.

The expatriate from Melbourne is arguably the most successful professional boxer that Australia has produced – she attained the ranking of best active professional boxer pound-for-pound in 2014 – but celebration of her world champion status remains disappointingly muted in her home country.

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The neurosurgeon saved the boxer’s life in 1991 and since then the pair have become close friends

“This man is my hero,” Michael Watson says simply as he turns to Peter Hamlyn, the neurosurgeon who saved his life and carried out seven operations on the stricken boxer’s brain in the aftermath of his fight against Chris Eubank in September 1991. “We are like family, me and Peter, and we have unusual banter. Peter says I’m a little bit dark to be family.”

Watson chuckles at his friend’s quip but, having interviewed Watson multiple times before and after the fateful bout that pushed him close to death, and having spent the morning with Hamlyn, I sense an essential truth. The brain surgeon and the boxer share a deeply compassionate intent to help each other.

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British Boxing’s trainer of the year is resolute in his commitment to the sport despite contending with stage four bowel and liver cancer

“I am a little scared,” Joe Gallagher says quietly as, in a deserted room upstairs at his famous old gym in Moss Side, Manchester, he addresses the stage four bowel and liver cancer that has taken hold of him. Two hours earlier, while giving me a guided tour of the Champs Camp gym where history and sweat seep from the peeling walls, Gallagher had been in roaring flow.

As six of his fighters shadowboxed each other, feinting and weaving in the crowded ring, the 56-year-old had yelled out instructions. Gallagher looked every inch the proud winner of the Trainer of the Year award – which he received last month at the British Boxing awards. But no matter how hard he works, or how cleverly he tries to find a strategy to overcome the odds, Gallagher has entered dark terrain. He loves the company of his fighters and his family, and appreciates the medical experts who urge him to pay more attention to cancer than boxing, but there are moments when he is alone with the disease.

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