After injured IBF welterweight champion Kell Brook was seen on Saturday night in Sheffield, clapping, cheering and allegedly raising his arms aloft ringside on the Eubank/Jeter card he was meant to be headlining, it only further stoked the fire of doubters claiming the rib injury that caused him to pull from his headline fight with Diego Chaves isn’t 100% genuine.
Promoter Eddie Hearn has been quick to shoot-down various whispers of Brook being off target with his weight, or unable to shift enough tickets to justify his PPV wages on a non-PPV broadcast; a miserable card that finally ended in loud jeering and booing on Saturday night, and really all but fell apart the moment Klitschko/Fury pulled out of ‘carrying it’ on a televised split anyway.
For many cynics, Brook pulling out of it late doors was a transparent move, given the notoriously hard to prove status of rib injuries generally and Hearn suggesting he would make medical evidence publicly available after sending it to the IBF, yet failing thus far to do so.
Throughout this time the promoter has been publicly agonising over whether or not Brook will box again this year, as well as being purposefully vague regarding the December show situation, and if it will be Box Office [with or without Brook], just 3 weeks after Klitschko/Fury…
In short, it’s a bit of a shambles, yet Brook himself is clear. He wants to box before the end of the year.
“It’s funny we start this interview with me smiling because I’m devastated tonight,” Brook said to iFLtv immediately after the Eubank card. “I should be here with a packed out arena. I’d put some serious work in, I’d spent a lot of money on this training camp and then, in the last sparring session I get a rib injury…..devastated.”
“It’s just about rest, obviously no sparring and I’m gonna see my physio, and we’ll work on the area properly. I’m just listening to my team but I’m fit and healthy, so hoping for a quick recovery and I’m wanting to get out before the end of the year.”
Now that WOULD dovetail nicely with December 12….
Twitter @Undilutedpoison
