Chris Eubank Jr drums his fingers against his plastic water bottle, staring past it and at the floor. After a long silence, filled with thought, he says: “I don’t think I’m gonna answer that one.”
Eubank Jr does not share his rival’s mistrust of the media, but on the cusp of his highly-anticipated rematch with Conor Benn, the 36-year-old is picking and choosing what to share when it comes to his stirring revelation this week: that he will be a father to twin boys. As Eubank Jr and Benn once again prepare to emulate their dads – Chris Sr and Nigel – with a rematch to mirror their fathers’ 30 years ago, it’s insisted there will be no third-generation showdown.
Sitting upstairs in Canary Wharf’s glassy Pelligon building, four days out from Saturday’s rematch, Eubank Jr looks almost unrecognisable from two versions of himself in April: the skeletal figure trying to make weight, and the swollen, hospitalised one after a blood-spattered thriller in Tottenham. Today, his eyes look only slightly sunken, the shape of his skull just subtly pronounced.
“The barbaric side of the weight-cut comes 24-36 hours before the weigh-in,” he tells several publications, including The Independent, gathered in a seated circle. “That’s when the pain kicks in.”
There will be more pain on Saturday if the sequel is anything like the first episode. While Eubank Jr was always one step ahead of Benn in April, outpointing his 29-year-old foe, their collision was thrilling nonetheless – an instant classic that left each Briton wearing face-altering damage.
It was the sort of duel that would surely unlock a mutual respect, if not a mutual liking between the competitors, and yet… Benn was readier to acknowledge his admiration of Eubank Jr than vice versa.
“He didn’t give up, that’s the only thing that shocked me,” Eubank Jr says now, before using Benn’s two-year drug-test saga as a reference point. “Men like that usually come with certain characteristics; when the going gets tough, they look to quit, because they don’t believe in themselves. I thought his mindset was weak and that once I dragged him into those deep waters, he would look for a way out. But to my shock and surprise, he didn’t.”
Eubank Jr is referring to the controversy that delayed his initial bout with Benn from 2022 until this year. On the eve of an October fight at London’s O2 Arena, three years ago, it was revealed that Benn had returned two adverse drug-test results. The banned substance clomifene was detected in his system, and he was ultimately unable to box in the UK again until November 2024. Benn has always proclaimed his innocence and, according to his father, spent almost £1m trying to prove that innocence.
Eubank Jr, however, continues to protest it. That is why he refrains from admitting to any respect towards Benn, and he certainly does not plan on sharing any niceties with his rival after the rematch.
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“What’s up with you guys and niceties?” he asks with a laugh. “This is the fight game, do you see what we’re doing to each other? This is not nice, this is not cordial, this is not friendly. People are trying to strip you of your health.
“Niceties never even come into my mind. There is always a chance there may be another fight, or something else is gonna happen, or something else is gonna be said. Any time I’ve ever been nice with people in this sport… I’ve seen it happen so many times, where you get stabbed in the back, or you get used, or you get betrayed, or you are unappreciated for the things you’ve done to help someone out.
“It’s happened to me time and time again, and I see it happening all over the world. In every gym, every city, I see people screwing each other over in this sport, as sad as it is to say. Yes, there are great people, normal and trustworthy people, but there are a lot of bad people in this sport, too. So, that’s taken away my niceties. I don’t have friends inside the boxing business; all my friends have nothing to do with this.”
Yet this doesn’t sadden Eubank Jr, “because I know what we have to do. I know what’s expected of us. This is a bloodsport, so can you really be surprised when people are doing all these underhanded things? It comes with the territory; if you’re going to be in a bloodsport, be prepared to deal with men with the mentality of savages.
“I don’t have to be [underhanded], no. That’s actually something I’ve prided myself on: having morals, being a stand-up guy, not lying to people, not stealing, not taking advantage. That’s something I really pride myself on, as a human being and as an athlete. Not taking drugs, not quitting in the ring, not taking days off in the gym.
“But fighters like that are rare.” So too are rivalries like this, and fights like April’s. The expectation is that, on Saturday, we will see another rare, rare encounter.
