Big in the UK, less so, by quite a margin, in the US and around the rest of the world: the Conor Benn Vs. Chris Eubank Junior fight – “The Next Generation Grudge Match.” We know the story, how the fight was supposed to have taken place a couple of years ago, only for Benn, son of course of the great Nigel Benn, to fail a couple of drugs tests.
Now, the hype even bigger, especially here in the UK, Eubank, son of course of the great Chris Eubank Snr, has gone into overdrive with the pre-fight insults. It’s been a lot of fun, with Eubank slapping Benn with an egg in the face (and being slapped with a nasty 100 grand fine as a result), and these two really do seem to dislike each other almost as much as their far more accomplished fathers disliked one another back in the day.
And now, the fight just a few weeks away (April 26), the respective pay-per-view prices have been announced. To go out live on DAZN, the fight will cost a UK fan £21.99, while a US fan will have to fork out $24.99. The rest of Europe will have to pay 24.99 Euros.
To be fair, this is not a greedy asking price, even if so many fight fans have a real problem with pretty much all PPV events. A fan subscribes to DAZN, paying a monthly fee (£24.99 in the UK) and yet he or she still has to cough up more dough for some fights (and remember when we were told streaming platform DAZN would pretty much mean the death of PPV?)
But Benn Vs. Eubank is a big fight, at least in terms of it capturing the imagination and the attention of the casuals. A recent appearance by both fighters on Piers Morgan’s show really brought in good numbers, and more hype. Now, how many buys will the April 26 fight generate?
The undercard is fair, some might say poor, but the name value here will likely, in fact almost certainly pull in plenty of British viewers who have been, perhaps unknowingly, intoxicated by the power of nostalgia as far as this fight goes (and to be sure, the two Benn-Eubank fights back in the 1990s really did capture the attention of the whole country, not just boxing fans). The fight will be a smash at the Box Office here in the UK, the rest of the world, who knows?
Will YOU be buying the fight on April 26th?