Chris Eubank Jr Entering Conor Benn Fight with Fractured Corner
When middleweight boxer Chris Eubank Jr (32-2, 23 KO’s) next slides through the ropes for combat, he will do so in a somewhat handicapped fashion. This is because he will face Conor “The Destroyer” Benn (21-0, 14 KO’s) at a catch-weight. Eubank is already on the books for saying he will be nowhere near 100% on the night. Yet, he maintains this is okay because he will only need 60% percent of his ability to conquer Benn. Time will tell if that is proven to be true.
ONE MAN SHORT
The notion of weight is not the only tall hurdle that Eubank Jr will have to hop on fight night. While providing an interview with IFL TV, Junior revealed that he has been training himself for this camp! Going a step further, he confessed that he very well may go into the match with no official trainer to speak of.
Over the course of the past few years, Eubank Jr. has been training with former boxing great Roy Jones Jr. During this working relationship, the UK bruiser has added a few more wrinkles to his game. So it should come as a rather notable shock to hear that the two will not ride into battle for his next duel. This is especially the case considering how high profile this upcoming prizefight will be.
“Roy [Jones Jr.] isn’t here, so who else is training me? Ronnie Davis is 165 years old, he is not training me, I’m training myself! I couldn’t get Roy over here, I couldn’t have that voice in my head while I was still trying to get my dad involved. And when it became apparent that he [his father] maybe wasn’t going to get involved in the training aspect, it was kind of too late. The camp was already half over and I was like, ‘bringing Roy in now is not really going to affect anything.’”
THE FAMILY BUSINESS
In another interesting twist, as he himself stated, Eubank Jr revealed that in his ideal world, his own father would helm his corner on fight night. On the one hand, this sounds reasonable enough. His father, Chris Eubank, is a UK legend in his own right. Also, Junior will face Conor Benn, the son of Nigel Benn, who was Chris Eubank’s most notorious rival. On the other hand however, the elder Eubank does not even want this match to take place!
Fearing that his son is putting his life on the line as result of the catchweight, Eubank would prefer that his son bow out of his affair. Clearly Junior felt differently, but still wants his father to be a part of the historical showdown.
“I’m still hoping that my dad comes and gets involved. If Roy is next to me, that is dead in the water completely and I want to leave every opportunity for him to come in. At the moment, my corner is Ronnie Davis and Anthony Brown, the two men that have been with me my entire career. Ideally we’ll get my old man in as well, that is the dream.”
There is no denying that Eubank is oozing with confidence! Yet, we shall have to see if confidence will outweigh his aggressive opponent, catch-weight blues, unorthodox training camp and potentially having no official chief second on fight night. Without question that is a notably substantial order! Luckily, no matter how the cards fall, 3Kings Boxing will be here to report the aftermath!
By: Bakari Simpson
