In a special blog, Glenn McCrory relives the day 20 years ago when he became champion of the world.
Glenn McCrory relives the day he ruled the world
The first memory I have of June 3, 1989, is getting up and going to get the papers. I wanted to see what Colin Hart had written in
The Sun. I wish I hadn't bothered because across the back page it just said: Glenn's a goner.
There I was a lad who had just sparred with Mike Tyson and done pretty well and all of a sudden I was being written off by Britain's leading boxing journalist.
So the biggest day of my life did not get off to the best of starts. With Colin's headline came a bit of a realisation that perhaps I didn't have a chance, maybe I was making a big mistake. The self-doubt didn't really creep in, it just sort of landed in front of me!
But the other abiding memory I have from that morning is that it soon went and all of a sudden, I remember thinking nothing had ever meant this much to me. Nothing.
I remember asking myself how much I wanted it. And I remember thinking that I was prepared to give my life to become a world champion. I was prepared to die for it and I can honestly say I had never felt about boxing like that before, and have not done since.
Maybe be it was because everybody, not least Colin, had already written me off. I had failed as a heavyweight but made some sort of miraculous comeback as a cruiserweight - which, if I am honest was always going to be my natural weight. I had actually started alright as a heavyweight because in my first fight I knocked a kid out inside the first round with the sweetest left hook I'd ever thrown - and they started to call me the 'White Bruno'.
But after a string of losses, I went back to square one, went home and started training myself in a makeshift gym - or a room with one punch-bag - above a shop. I didn't even have a proper coach, just my assistant coach as an amateur, yet somehow I made it to British, European and Commonwealth champion.
Decked
The vacant world title was next and I was in against a lad called Patrick Lumumba. We didn't have the internet or DVD's back then of course, but someone had sent me a tape - a good old-fashioned VHS - so I thought I'd sit down and watch it. Well, it was Lumumba against James Broad - who was not bad - and he decked him with a huge right in the first round! I'd seen enough and turned it off.
But here I was, the day of the fight. I remember it vividly, the sun was shining (which is pretty miraculous for the north east in June) and here I was fighting in my own neighbourhood. Somehow the local council had bid the taxpayers' money to hold the fight and it was to be at a leisure centre in Stanley. It was a Labour council back then and I'm not sure you would get that happening today!
People worked round the clock at the leisure centre to get it ready; they took off doors, moved everything around to squeeze 2,000 people in and changed it completely.
The best thing about though, was I could walk there from my house as it was only a couple of streets away. I remember nipping in to see my wife and kid (I only had one then) and picking up my bag before setting off. When I left I couldn't believe my eyes - there were people lining the main street in Stanley. And all for me!
There were gents in tuxedos, people of all ages. I remember seeing Richard Dunn, who had fought Muhammad Ali, there, PJ Proby was there and the cast of Auf Wiedersehen Pet were there. And all of these (then) famous people were there for me!
Yet somehow I didn't feel nervous. I had to get changed in the squash courts at the centre and I remember feeling so calm, while everyone around me was in a mad panic. They all looked at me as if I was heading off to the gallows, but I had this eerie calmness and sat there just watching the mayhem go on around me. It was if I knew it was my destiny, my night.
Nerves
Not many in my camp shared that feeling and I know for a fact that many of them had backed Lumumba. They had seen him spar and seen him do well and put money on him. Thanks lads!
When the guy popped his head round the door and said 'you're next', I knew what they were thinking. Sometimes before a fight you do get that sense of doom and all of a sudden, there it was. That's when the nerves finally kicked in. And my entrance music did me no favours either.
My brother had, presumably for a joke, chosen 'Simply Irresistible' by Robert Palmer for me to come out to. Now it might have been my destiny, it might have been my night and I might have been a decent boxer, but I know I wasn't irresistible! It was great to see everyone packed in, cheering the roof of though, it really was.
It wasn't so good to see Lumumba when I climbed into the ring. There he was, leaning in his corner looking like he was out for a stroll, like all he had to do was turn up and the world title was his. He even gave me a nice smile which triggered something in me. I just thought 'right mate, you're gonna get it' - or words to that effect.
When that first bell went I was like a man possessed. I ran straight across the ring, threw the sweetest left hook I've ever thrown and almost knocked him out! It was worse than Amir Khan against Breidis Prescott, but thankfully I didn't get the same response. In fact, it took everything out of Lumumba there and then, broke his spirit.
Warriors
After that, I do remember certain moments in the fight. I remember, when it was all kicking off, getting a bit rough on the inside, looking out into the crowd and all I could see was the actor Tim Healy (Dennis from Auf Wiedersehen Pet) and he winked at me. And there I was, fighting for a world title, winking back!
The other outstanding memory from the fight itself was that in the last two rounds, the entire crowd started stamping their feet in unison. You see and read about African warriors doing it and here we were in Stanley and they were doing exactly the same thing! And it worked.
Come the end of the 12th, I knew it was mine, but when the MC announced 'and the new' and my arm went up, it was just an amazing feeling. Sadly for this blog, words can't describe it, I promise you.
I knew I had won, because I pretty much battered him, even chucked him against the ropes and urged him to 'come on', but the moment I was declared a world champion was something I will never, ever forget. To be the north east's first ever, and sad to say only, world champion meant so, so much to me.
The celebrations were of course, fabulous. But a bit like before the fight, I was very calm. I was knackered of course, but this party was put on at a big hotel and the celebrations were pretty much going on around me, not involving me.
I suppose that after such a high, there is always a low and that was it. It was madness and it was all for me... champion of the world!
Summit
But if I thought that was a low, then it was nothing compared to waking up the next morning. It is the nicest feeling in the world to win a world title, but the next day it was the worst feeling I had ever experienced.
I had the belt, but all of a sudden, for the first time in my adult life, I didn't know what to do next; all of a sudden I had no goal, nothing to work towards. I suppose it is a bit like climbing Mount Everest and sticking the flag in the summit - your next move has to be down.
I did lose something I think because I never had it easy and had to work hard to achieve that dream and all of a sudden I had done it. I knew with my weight-making problems I wouldn't reign long as a world champion but I had done it nonetheless.
I was signed up by
Sky Sports to become their first boxing pundit on the back of that it has given way to a wonderful second career, which I love doing and have been privileged to do.
And 20 years on, I still have the IBF cruiserweight belt sat on my shelf and I am Glenn McCrory, former world champion. Whatever I do, whatever happens in boxing, whatever people say about me, nothing is going to change that.
Do you remember Glenn winning a world title? If so let us know your memories by filling in the feedback form below...
