I’ll tell you where the bad blood started. So I was never that worried about the amateurs. “We were much better but our style was more suited to the pro game. We did not box in that stiff way like amateur boxers …”īrook holds up his arms like a robot and grins. Herol Graham and Prince Naseem Hamed led the way and I followed their style. “I come from the Brendan Ingle gym in Wincobank and we were never liked by the amateur boxing people. But after a couple of rounds I was OK.”ĭid the bad blood between them start when the teenage Khan was selected for the 2004 Olympic Games where, showing extraordinary talent, he won a surprise silver medal while Brook remained in obscurity in Sheffield? “That’s not correct,” Brook says. When we first sparred I noticed how fast his hands were and it took some getting used to. Khan has said that when they sparred as amateurs he was so much better than Brook he could outbox him using just one hand. When did he first meet Khan? “I can’t remember the exact day or time, but it must have been where we were 15. I am more interested in trying to establish the cause of the feud Brook has stoked for so long. The Bolton boxer insisted that he had not said anything homophobic. There’s no racial angle there at all.” Khan, in turn, has been accused of homophobia by apparently questioning Brook’s sexuality. Poppadoms just break, which is the same as his chin. People shouldn’t be racist.”īrook denied the allegation and said Khan is “trying to get everyone on his side and think I’m some kind of racist character when I’m not. At the end of the day we’re fighting each other but you still have some sort of respect for him – I think that’s gone out the window now. “It gives me an added push to stick it on him and give him a proper beating. “It’s so sad that he had to come out with a comment like that,” Khan said on Thursday. Brook mocked Khan’s “poppadum chin” and has been accused of racism. “I’ve had more than 40 fights and been tested so often – so it doesn’t bother me what he says.” “It’s just him trying to get in my head,” Brook says with a shrug. It’s unlikely that Khan ever feared him but he has spoken disparagingly of Brook and said: “He has lived off my name for years.” “There was some fear in him and he never wanted to fight me.” But does Brook feel that Khan wanted to avoid losing to him because defeat to a local rival would sting so much? “You’ve hit the nail on the head,” Brook says with relish. Khan has never shown the same enthusiasm for the contest and, over the years, he has claimed that he had far more significant fights to chase in America than a domestic dust-up which won’t much mean much outside the UK. I’ve trained even harder for Khan than against Porter, Golovkin and Spence. I fought for world titles and against some of the greatest fighters, and Khan had done the same, but this one means so much. Eleven out of 20 went for Khan but almost everyone stressed that the win would mean even more to Brook, whose animosity has simmered for years.īrook suggests that the contest will define their legacies. In recent weeks, when I asked a range of boxing insiders to pick the winner, the split between those backing Khan’s speed to be decisive and those who believe Brook might stop his despised rival was marginal. We’re both coming to win but he doesn’t have much of a chin and we all know it’s going to be explosive in there.” “No one knows what Khan has got left and people are wondering the same about me. “People want to see this fight because it’s real intriguing,” Brook counters. That phrase has been applied to Brook and Khan for years, yet here they are, on the eve of a hotly anticipated British fight with no title at stake and their reputations diminished. There is a terrible term in boxing which describes old fighters as “damaged goods”. He also showed great heart in facing the much bigger man in Golovkin and then the dangerous Spence in back-to-back fights which almost ruined him. His world title win against Marcos Maidana was boxing’s Fight of the Year in 2010, and showed that Khan was as immensely brave as he could be quick and skilful.īrook’s finest night also came in the US, in 2014, when he went to California and outpointed the excellent American Shawn Porter in a gruelling fight to become the IBF welterweight champion. Khan proved himself as a multiple world champion who brought blistering hand speed to the ring. Photograph: Andrew Couldridge/Action Images/Reuters Terence Crawford puts Amir Khan on the canvas in 2019.
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