LIVE24SEVEN // Interviews
projecting a devastating demeanour and power, that it’s only now that people are saying, “Who the hell is this guy?” I thought they could see it before. I thought people could hear me, but they didn’t, he had to perform like he did in this fight for people to embrace what he is and see the excitement that he is! So he’s the one to watch in my view and I don’t think there’s any doubt about that! When you watch a fight there’re good fighters, but then there are those that aren’t just good, they’re exciting, they excite you and Junior’s one of those and they are very rare to come across.
You’ve held other titles too, to include Britain’s Best Dressed Man on several occasions. What stirred your passion for fashion, was it a need to set yourself apart from others in your profession or create a persona or simply a keen eye for looking good? Image is conditioning, I was picked up for not having the ability to dress nice or have nice clothes and I suppose that stirred something within me to fix that. From the day a girl looked me up and down in Peckham in 1979, I don’t think I’ve never been ill-dressed since then…I hope. You’ve been super stylish! Thank you Katie – here’s’ something for you, when I was a child I had to go to Sunday school and at Sunday school you had to wear your Sunday best, so when I made champion of the world in 1990 I decided to wear my Sunday best every single day and that’s why they decided to give me so many awards for my style! My Sunday best!
What are your thoughts on women in boxing? I believe in a society that taught me to be protective of women, intellectually to be protective of the female, not so much the physicality, as there aren’t that many idiots thank God that would be heavy handed with women, you protect women, their dignity etc. So when Tony Blair came into power women had the right to do anything that the man could do and boxing was one of those things. I would ask the public to give me some time, it’s been my conditioning for so long to protect women and with boxing, I can change with time, but I ask the public to give me just a little time to get used to it. We’re all inspired by Rocky because he heard the call of duty, he fights with his face and did it for Adrian and his face is all bloodied and puffed up and it’s romantic because it is masculinity, so I’m asking for some time to just adjust because if you are asking me to find it romantic for a female to project what Rocky does – well I just need a bit of time.
Will you be taking to the ring with Benn soon? Well, just keep this in mind – it could be the safest thing I could do because in order to contest such a spirit I would have to get myself into tremendous shape and to get into tremendous shape would give me years of great mobility, so the gains – and not in terms of wealth or notoriety, but in terms of health, mobility, being vibrant – that’s the most exciting thing about fighting that man again.
The big fight next year between Groves and your son, how
many rounds do you think it will go? Again I ask the referee to look after him, but equally look after my son’s opponent.
So finally your one man show; if you could summarise why people should come and see it – and I can think of a million and one reasons why – what would you say? The honesty in what you have to say is a big attraction as well? Yes, the honesty, but it will be interesting because everything that I’ve done in life has had a reason behind it and the reason behind it is what the public may not understand or currently know. If behind everything is reason then what I have done has been reasonable – it’s just that the media haven’t been able to convey the reasons behind what I do correctly. So whether it was challenging or protesting, there has been a reason behind everything and being able to communicate the perception behind that reason an audience should find interesting!
Thank you so much for your time Chris. No, thank you Katie.
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