BN readers voted Frazier-Ali I as their favourite fight of the seventies and Hagler-Hearns from the eighties. What’s their choice for best fights from the nineties?
THE premise for Desert Island Fights is simple: You will soon be stranded on a desert island. To ease the boredom, you can take along one – and only one – fight from each of the last five decades (1970s, 1980s, 1990s, 2000s and 2010s) to watch while you’re there. Which five fights do you take?
For many fans, the 1990s was the last true golden era. The decade began when Mike Tyson was still an invincible man and it ended with his powers exposed. That descent, which was bumpy in the extreme, saw fighters like Evander Holyfield, Riddick Bowe and Lennox Lewis pass Tyson on their way up.
It was an era that gave us the best of James Toney and Roy Jones Jnr, it cemented the greatness of Julio Cesar Chavez, Arturo Gatti laid the foundations to his thrill-seeker reputation while little savages Michael Carbajal and Humberto Gonzalez generated their own million-dollar rivalry.
In the UK, Nigel Benn and Chris Eubank seduced the entire nation by bashing lumps into each other while “Prince” Naseem Hamed – the most cocksure of them all – threatened to take over the world…
5. CHRIS EUBANK w rsf 9 NIGEL BENN (1990)
A HELLACIOUS affair that, when all our votes were counted, nudged Ike Ibeabuchi’s violent heavyweight victory over David Tua out of the top five. What else is there to say about this eternally watchable encounter that hasn’t already been said? It’s a contest that cemented both fighters in British boxing history while introducing the enigmatic Eubank, a natural showman with balls of steel, to the world. In turn, Benn learned his lessons from the defeat to rebound in style.
WATCH OUT FOR:
The hatred and ferocity on Benn’s face during the referee’s instructions. Barely able to contain himself, Benn visibly loads up as referee Richard Steele invites them to touch gloves. Eubank – who placed a £1,000 on himself to win in the opening round – then answers the first bell by turning to his side and gliding towards Benn back-first. It’s all fascinating, furious and borderline comedic.
DID YOU KNOW:
Two weeks after the fight, Nigel Benn’s debut (and only) single, Stand and Fight, was released. A taster: ‘I’m the warrior, that makes you sorrier, the destroyer, I will annoy ya, so goodnight my friend and amen, tell them you just met big bad Benn’. It peaked at number 61 in the UK charts; something of a travesty when one considers Ice Ice Baby by Vanilla Ice was number one at the time.
4. NASEEM HAMED w rsf 4 KEVIN KELLEY (1997)
A MESMERISING clash that is a glowing advertisement for Naseem Hamed’s unique daredevil act. There was the unforgettable journey into the ring when the Sheffield superstar, dancing and gliding through confetti, was intent on making his presence felt in New York. Then came the action inside the ropes against an accomplished and talented Kevin Kelley. Hamed, at times, was brilliant. But predominantly he was careless, over-eager and the knockdown-fest was all the more entertaining for it.
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WATCH OUT FOR:
The moment when all hell breaks loose. For the first two minutes of the opening round, Hamed is disciplined and effective as his jab – often underused – breaks down Kelley impressively. Then Hamed walks into a shot, hits the deck for the first of the bout’s six knockdowns and all control goes out of the window.
DID YOU KNOW:
The bout – in which Kelley led on two of the three cards at the time of the stoppage – exceeded all expectation. In the US alone, 2.5m viewers tuned into HBO (who had paid $1m for a marketing campaign to get Hamed’s name out there) to watch the action, which was unusual for a featherweight contest at that time.
