CHRIS EUBANK on ITV,  fighting for a world super-middleweight title.

Chris Eubank posing. Chris Eubank antagonising. Chris Eubank dealing with the aftermath of inflicting life-threatening injuries on an opponent.

The sense of deja vu is overwhelming as Eubank junior prepares to fight Aussie Renold Quinlan for the little-regarded IBO crown.

Should Junior, 27, win at London’s Olympia on February 4, the Eubanks will hail themselves as the first British father and son ever to have held world titles. Most fight fans will insist he has to wait to gain a ‘proper’ belt.

Spending an hour with the Eubanks at former British heavyweight champion Scott Welch’s  subterranean gym beneath the prom at Hove is a dizzying experience.

Eubank Sr remains an eccentric, intriguing, complex character — capable of being amusing then  chilling, almost in the same breath.

One minute he is telling you how shaking hands with the godfather of soul James Brown turned him into a ‘mesmerising’ dancer.

The next he tells you how his son could have killed fellow British fighter Nick Blackwell last year.

And how, unlike his own experience after his tragic victory over Michael Watson in 1991, Eubank Jr has not lost his finishing instinct.

Boxing is no ordinary family  business. Eubank Sr’s legend includes flooring Watson with a devastating uppercut which, along with a lack of adequate medical back-up, meant the Londoner almost died from a blood clot on the brain and took years to make a painstaking, partial recovery.

And Junior’s brutal British middleweight title win over Blackwell in March 2016 ended in a tenth-round TKO, with Eubank Sr urging his son to stop targeting his opponent’s head.

Blackwell suffered bleeding to the skull and was placed in a medically-induced coma. He fell back into a coma after an ill-judged return to sparring last month.

Eubank Sr said: “That young man could have died. When I stopped Nigel Benn in 1990, he wasn’t allowed to take as much punishment as  Junior gave this kid.

“Why did the referee not stop it? That was an awful beating but we’re being taught how to think by  promoters saying, ‘The referee stepped in at the right time’. No he didn’t.”

Asked how the Watson fight affected him, Eubank Sr admitted: “I lost my finishing instinct because of it. If I couldn’t take them out clean, I’d just out-box them, I wouldn’t bludgeon them.

"But the anguish I suffered, Junior has picked that up.

“There’s a history and his subconscious is impregnated with it. What makes him a better fighter than me is that his personality isn’t like mine.

“I’m kind. If a man is in trouble, I’d see it and back off. He is not like that. If you buckle, you’ll get electrocuted.”

Eubank Jr, more softly spoken than his bombastic dad, claims the Blackwell fight  merely sharpened him up.

And he said: “I don’t believe it has stopped me being able to finish an opponent.

"It’s just made me more intent on becoming a better fighter so it doesn’t happen to me.

“Before it happened, you think that sort of thing happens to other people, not me —  even with what happened to my dad.

"But when you’ve caused a man to be in a coma, you see how real it is.

“When you’re fighting, you’re  thinking, ‘This guy is trying to take my head off so I’m going to take his head off’ —  especially when it gets into a war  like with Blackwell.

“But I was being reminded in the corner, ‘He’s in a bad way’. I took a second to look and  backed off a little.

"Then the ref took him  to the doctor who said no.”

Related Stories

Eubank Sr insists  after Quinlan his son will seek the biggest fights at middleweight or super-middleweight — Gennady Golovkin, James DeGale and a re-match with Billy Joe Saunders, his only defeat in 24 pro contests.

Junior was accused of ducking Golovkin last year, with Kell Brook stepping up and losing to the mighty Kazakh in a five-round brawl.

But after leaving Eddie Hearn’s Matchroom stable, Eubank Sr said: “We aren’t ducking anything, we’ll get that fight with Golovkin now.”

And when he discusses Brook’s defeat, Eubank Sr is unsparing.

He said: “Kell’s corner threw the towel in after five rounds. Kell will end up despising that man.

“He had the chance to do what I did against Watson or Benn. He had the chance to make a benchmark in boxing but by the Tuesday that fight had been forgotten.

"He was robbed of the opportunity to show valour. It’s not a game to a fighter, it’s his life and he had the opportunity to win hearts.

"Nobody cares about him now. It’s a very cruel sport.

“Taking a beating wins people’s hearts. The only reason I won hearts was because of what I went through with Watson and Benn and the beatings I took against Joe Calzaghe and Carl Thompson.

“I got beaten to a pulp by  Calzaghe. I was lying on the floor in the bathroom cubicle with Richard Branson kneeling down and consoling me for half an hour.”

So then why would any father ever encourage his son in such a  dangerous ‘game’?

Eubank Sr says it took years of pleading from Junior before he packed his son off to Las Vegas to learn his trade under Jamaican  legend Mike McCallum and Floyd Mayweather senior, with Mike Tyson an interested onlooker.

Which brings us to Eubank Sr’s theory regarding James Brown.

He said: “I always could dance but in the late 90s I went to see James Brown at the Natural History Museum.

"I had my cane and my bowler hat on, I was dancing and he walked over and shook my hand.

“I have taken his DNA and something passes over to me. Since then I feel my dancing is mesmerising.  MESMERISING!

“When Junior was eight months old, Mike Tyson held him at a Versace show on Madison Avenue.

"Then McCallum trained him, Mayweather senior trained him, (Cuban Olympic legend) Teofilo Stevenson has touched him.

“This may be idle talk but it means something to me. When I said I didn’t think Junior would be this good, maybe it’s coming from these great people he has touched.”

Many have urged Junior to step out of his father’s shadows but  he  said: “To believe I’m only here because of my father is madness.

“If you can’t fight, you’re not going to make it. Your father cannot take punches for you.”

Eubank Sr hopes his boy might eventually attract something like the 17.5million viewers who watched him fight Benn on ITV in 1993.

He said: “It’s rare you find a father and son who are world champions,  a son who moves the dynasty forward.

“They’ve tried it in Hollywood  movies like Creed. But he couldn’t fight, you could see he was an actor not a boxer. This man can fight.”

Source: Read Full Article