CHRIS EUBANK SR has opened up on the heartbreaking reason behind his rise to the very top of boxing.
Senior, 58, is vehemently against son Chris Junior’s showdown with Conor Benn on Saturday night.
Chris Eubank Sr outlined his heartbreaking journey to becoming world champion
Eubank Sr wanted to become world champion to gain his elder brothers’ respect
GettyEubank Jr and Benn face off at the final press conference ahead of Saturday’s fight[/caption]
Eubank’s brother Simon, with his boxer son Harlem as a toddler
Eubank started boxing to get the respect of his brothers
The British boxing legend maintains the fight should not happen, insisting his son dropping down to 160lbs is “dangerous”.
The former two-weight world champion fears his 35-year-old lad’s weight drop risks the same damage that left his older brother Simon paying the ultimate price for a career in boxing.
Simon lost 20 brutal fights, 11 of them by stoppage, before his tragic death in September 2023.
In an exclusive interview with SunSport, Senior has now told the heartbreaking story behind his own journey into boxing.
He reveals the sole reason he took up the sport in the first place was to gain respect from his elder brothers Peter and Simon.
He says: “Boxing became important to me because it was the way in which I was going to win the respect of my brothers.
“That’s the reason why it was important to me. Because I could do everything else.
“My brothers used to give me a really hard time, beyond what I can actually express to you. And they were doing this because I was intelligent.
“And this is why I got my bottom roasted by them all the time.”
He added: “I loved my brothers, and they despised me. I couldn’t work it out then. Why?
“To one I was a fool, to the other I was an idiot, and to one, he didn’t even speak to me.
“That was the most brutal of psychological beatings, when someone ignores you.
“I’m talking about you’re in the room and never spoke to me. Never spoke to me.
“One day I’m going to cry about that, because I’m getting close to that.”
Both Peter and Simon were boxers, and it was aged 14 that Senior decided he would follow suit.
He had endured a tough upbringing, and was suspended 18 times in one year from his secondary school in Peckham, claiming he was trying to protect his classmates from bullies.
Chris Eubank Jr vs Conor Benn
THE countdown is ON to one of the biggest boxing events of the 21st Century
Familial tension and a rivalry that has been brewing for years will finally be resolved when Chris Eubank Jr and Conor Benn meet at the Tottenham Hotspur Stadium on Saturday night.
There has been huge drama in the build-up with the pair engaged in a war of words and multiple clashes in person.
SunSport will have full coverage of the blockbuster clash all week and LIVE round-by-round coverage of every fight on a stacked undercard.
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Eubank Jr vs Benn – Start time, full undercard, TV and stream for huge night
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Best bets – Get Eubank Jr at 30/1 and Benn at 40/1
Earning respect
At 14, Senior decided he would step into the ring and give boxing his best shot – whether he was any good or not.
He recalls: “At 14, I’m saying to myself, even if I’m no good at boxing, they’re going to respect me because it takes so much courage to get into the ring and box.
“I was standing on a table in a home in North Wales in a place called Llangollen, and I was dancing in the mirror.
“At 14 years old, you know, you’ve got all that energy, and I was looking in the mirror like, you know what, I’m going to be a fighter.”
He decided he would be world champion. And he stuck to his word.
Ten years later, 24-year-old Senior beat Nigel Benn to win the WBO Middleweight Championship.
Reaching the top
Senior continues: “When I fought Benn on the 18th of November, 1990, I won their respect that particular night.”
He admits his brothers were “never” kind to him, but ultimately it acted as the driving force behind his rise to boxing royalty.
He recalls: “Brother, you are a really serious tosspot. That’s what I got from them.
“But all of this has done nothing but drive me to be better and better and better.”
Despite the complex relationship he had with the pair, Senior still holds an enormous place in his heart for his two brothers.
Speaking at the time of Simon’s death, Senior told SunSport: “Simon saved my life once. He is the one who truly loved me and that is why I recited Corinthians 1:13 at his funeral.
‘Love is most powerful’
“It talks about how love is the most powerful of all things, and I recited that for him and for what he did for me.
“In many respects, it is mercy that he has left us. He is truly at rest now.”
Senior blames boxing for Simon’s tragic death, choking back tears as he reveals his brother battled frontal lobe dementia, and had son Harlem feeding him with a baby bottle in his final days.
He tells SunSport: “My son probably walks around at around 180lbs and he has to boil himself down to 160lbs.
“People don’t understand what it means for Junior to get down to 160lbs, at his age. They don’t understand the drying out.
“Junior is now 35 and trying to get down to 160lbs and I know what that feels like. I know about the dehydration and the damage it does to fighters.
‘It will be a car crash’
“I am more concerned about that than anything else. I don’t want my son getting down to 160lbs. And that is why I have spoken about people trying to murder my boy by boiling him down to 157 lbs.”
He adds: “I would be in my son’s corner if he was fighting at the right weight. But it mocks everything I stand for and fought for.
“I am his dad and the fact he has chosen not to listen means all I can do is step back and watch the car crash – because it will be a car crash.
“He doesn’t understand that this is boxing and you lose your faculties, this is dangerous.”
Eubank Jr‘s promoter Ben Shalom also reiterated to SunSport that the original fight scheduled for 2022 “should never” have been at 157, though he maintains his fighter will make weight at 160lbs on Friday’s weigh-in.
Courtesy of a rehydration clause in the fight deal, Eubank Jr can only weigh in at a maximum of 170lbs at a 10am weigh-in on Saturday morning, hours before he takes to the ring in one of the most fiercely anticipated British fights in years.
Watch Sun Sport’s full preview of Chris Eubank Jr vs Conor Benn – with former world champion George Groves, Chris Eubank Sr and Harlem Eubank – on our YouTube channel.
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