In the names of their fathers – so the promotion starts – Chris Eubank Junior and Conor Benn Box on a football field on Saturday evening. Just like Chris Senior and Nigel Benn did it to Old Trafford over 30 years ago.
The sons will put a loot net at Tottenham Hotspur Stadium. At 10 million pounds sterling for Eubank and 8 million pounds sterling for Benn, about 25 times more than their dads won in each of their two fights.
It is time to remind the offspring of two great British fighters what we will expect from the crowd of 60,000 people, millions of television subscribers and Saudi payers. The clearest optics go through a nostalgic lens on their father’s performance against each other in the early 90s.
Benn was born and raised in Irford then served in the army in Germany and Northern Ireland. Eubank was born in Dulwich, spent its first six years in Jamaica and then endured an intimidated and intimidated education in the poorest districts of London before learning to box in the Bronx.
Benn exploded on the boxing scene, beating his first 22 opponents. Eubank opened his professional career with five points victories in Atlantic City before returning to England to start adding KOs to his record. Benn was a force of nature, Eubank a rapid learner determined to improve as a person as well as in the ring.
The nicknames say everything about their differences. Benn – The Dark Destroyer – remains tough on the edges, still, at 59, for a fight. EUBANK – Simply the best – has acquired a higher class accent, a taste to wear jodhpurs, horse riding boots, player hats and a monocle and transport of a silver handle rod.
Nigel Benn (left) and Chris Eubank (right) had one of the most captivating rivalries of boxing
Eubank won the first fight and the second was a less brutal affair, ending with a draw
In the photo of his monocle, the personality of Eubank found himself Benn and they were polar opposites
On November 18, 1990, at the National Exhibition Center in Birmingham, a purnitous resentment between Eubank Sr and Benn the elder exploded. The Benn team has arranged for sabotage the accompaniment of the Eubank ring promenade, Tina Turner is simply the best because it started playing.
Eubank made Benn funeral with his safe on the strings on the canvas and, not for the first time, everyone threatened to knock the other – Benn through the tight teeth, Eubank with his acquired lisp, as he posted in his provocative and theatrical way.
What followed was an epic battle for Benn’s average WBO weight title that the third man in the ring, Richard Steele, described as “the most dramatic fight I have arbitrated”.
Eubank came out at Bell Crab, the side, and the first of many net rights surprised Benn, who began to chase his sworn enemy around the ring.
He caught up in the fourth, landing an immense right uppercut which brought the language of Eubank so severely that he swallowed a flow of blood for the rest of the fight for fear that it could be stopped if he is seen by his corner or Steele.
The answer was so urgent that at the end of the fifth of Benn’s eyes was practically closed and the other swelling.
A right on the right dropped Eubank at the beginning of the eighth, but he recovered to finish the round so strongly that he linked rather than sit on his stool before the ninth made a monumental climax to an epic fight.
Eubank only rushed to be handed over, this time by a left hook. Fearing two boosts could count against him, he continued Benn with revenge, the Tigner with combinations then pinning him under a dam of blows so heavy that Steele agitated him with five seconds to play.
Chris Eubank Jr (left) and Conor Benn (right) are fighting as their fathers did on Saturday
Benn raises Eubank in the air during their 1990 clash for the average WBO weight title
For three years, the British boxing public demanded a revenge match. And these calls were answered by the American promoter Don King by hiring Old Trafford for the cold and humid night of October 9, 1993.
This second edition was less brutal, although more scientific. He ended with the fiery draw with which Benn kept the title of the WBC World Super-Middlewight which he had collected in the meantime and had a heavier impact on the future of male and British boxing. Incredibly, King neglected to put a revenge clause in the contracts even if he had committed to sign both the winner and the loser.
BI-POLAR diagnosed after his retirement, Benn would continue to have a tormented time. He tried to commit suicide in 1999 in the despair of sexual dependence and how that, as well as drug tampons, damaged his wife and family.
He found a new goal in Australia, where he worked with charities for children and collect funds for boxing gymnasiums.
Eubank’s anti-war activism led him to be arrested for driving a truck around the flags of the Parliament carrying flags condemning Tony Blair for having sent troops to Iraq. Although failed from his extravagance and two divorces, he is the ambassador of the Gamcare game charity.
Despite these disparate personalities, their responses to inflict horrible damage who changed life to opponents were also full of compassion.
Eubank was an anti-war activist and condemned Tony Blair for sending troops to Iraq
Benn, illustrated on his personalized Mercedes in 1992, was united in Eubank by Sport but they are not friends
In June 1991, at the White Lane Stadium in Tottenham, Michael Watson, collapsed 29 seconds in the last round of his second fight with Eubank. For 40 days in a coma, Watson underwent six brain operations and it took eight years before regaining his sight, his speech and the ability to walk with sticks. Eubank paid constant attention to its recovery and walked with Watson during his six -day London marathon.
In February 1995, at the London Arena, one of the most dreaded pumpers in the world, Gerald McClellan, came to challenge Benn for his WBC average title. On his feet in the 10th round, the referee agitated him in favor of Benn. Four weeks in a coma and in -depth brain surgery later, the Americans returned to the house almost blind, deaf and confined to a wheelchair. Benn always monitors his recovery and organized a dinner to help pay McClellan health care.
They are united by their sport but are not friends. In private, they respect everyone’s skills and courage, if not their characters.
It is unlikely that they were found to eat together this fighting week. Some family quarrels never end.
