Brook vs Spence Jr: Talking points from world title fight at Bramall Lane in Sheffield
Monday 29 May 2017 07:16, UK
Did he quit? Kell Brook's Sheffield homecoming was spoiled by his brilliant and ambitious challenger, not by his own lack of desire...
We'll never truly know what was going through Kell Brook's mind as he propped himself up on the ropes, sunken onto one knee, with the referee barking and 27,000 people gasping. His left eye was blinking feverishly, appallingly swollen and eerily similar to the injury he sustained against Gennady Golovkin last September that cost him his unbeaten record, and might have cost him even more.
Then, the fight ended.
There is no sight in boxing like a fighter quitting; in the most visceral of individual sports, the ultimate victory is in forcing your opponent to look for a way out. But that's not what happened on Saturday at Bramall Lane, and that's not what Kell Brook has ever stood for.
Brook was gifted an opportunity to head for the hills in the 10th round, just minutes before his eventual defeat, with the area around his left eye already grotesquely trebled in size. He had been floored by Errol Spence Jr, the challenger who proved his toughness alongside his talent, and at that moment it would have been easy to quit.
He rose to his feet, as boxers are conditioned to do, but more importantly he fought back. Not just survived, not just existed for existence's sake. Brook ended the round decently, digging as deep as he's ever been asked to do before, moments after the end seemed certain.
But the injury was too severe, and a round later, ended the fight as Brook collapsed to the canvas. It was his left eye this time, after Golovkin broke the bones surrounding his right eye last year, but must have still have caused terrible reminders. It is still only eight months since Brook remained upright through five rounds against one of the sport's most ferocious punchers. Ask Golovkin if Brook has an ounce of quit in him.
"I think the demons came back from the Golovkin fight," said Amir Khan from ringside. But it was the voice of Khan's fellow pundit, Tony Bellew, who caused the most debate.
"[Brook] had the fight beaten out of him," Bellew said. You've got to remember he's been through a bad injury. He's probably thinking in the back of his mind 'I could go blind if I don't do this...'
"But you have to expel all those things from your mind."
Bellew was harsh, undoubtedly, but he might have struck upon a point that went under the radar. "He had the fight beaten out of him" - Brook lost because of the excellence of his challenger, Spence Jr, not because of his own vulnerability.
"He's one of the best kids I've been in with - if not the best," Brook conceded.
"I got caught in the seventh round in the left eye. It was like the Golovkin fight, although not quite as bad. He caught me in the 11th and the double vision just stuck.
"I would have got through the fight but, when you can't see, there's nothing you can do."
Spence Jr, now unbeaten in 22, unleashed his trademark body punches like a venom that would silently and slowly dismember its victim. They landed from the opening bell, never caused much fuss, and didn't disappear until the fight's conclusion.
The skilful southpaw had cut such a relaxed and calculated figure all week in Sheffield that it was fair to debate his naivety, but by dealing with a world champion of Brook's calibre, he displayed maturity beyond the evidence of his CV. Meanwhile, those body shots kept landing. Again, and again.
The combination that floored Brook originally was punctuated by a shot to the mid-section. The first time in Spence Jr's career that he felt the 11th round, he didn't even need three minutes to confirm himself as the world champion.
Blaming Brook's defeat on not having the stomach to keep fighting would be doing a disservice to Spence Jr, who established himself as one of the most talented foreign boxers to grace us with their presence in years. Brook will be back, and he will return from two significant injuries to box at an elite level, because as he has proved before, you cannot keep him down.
