Brook Looks Back On His Rivalry With Khan And More

Kell Brook looked back on his rivalry with Amir Khan.

The pair finally put their bad blood to rest when they faced off in 2022. Brook came out victorious, stopping Khan in the sixth round, making him the best British welterweight of that period. Following the fight, there was controversy as Khan failed a test for Ostarine.

He denied taking it intentionally, but he received a two-year ban backdated. That will expire in April, leaving him the right to make a return. But looking back, Brook was frustrated by the questions surrounding the Khan fight, given how long it had taken to make it.

Brook On Khan

“When people say that I hate Amir Khan, I just hated the fact that he was bugging me wherever I went. People always brought it up asking when we were going to fight – I was sick of it. I think he 100 percent ducked the fight with me.

“It’s different when you lose to Canelo Alvarez or Manny Pacquiao, you can try and say ‘well at least I fought them’, but with a domestic fight there is a lot more pressure. It’s hard to deal with and I don’t think he was scared of me; I think he was scared of that. There was a big build up for this fight for many years and we eventually got there,” Brook said

Brook’s Troubles

Despite the fight getting made, Brook did pay a price. He failed to secure the big fights when he was the IBF Welterweight Champion. Brook was not seen as a commercial draw, while at the same time, the Brit posed a high-risk fight. He had beaten Shawn Porter, who was seen as the next big star in boxing at the time, to get the belt.

The failure to get those big fights meant that Brook jumped two weight classes to take on GGG. That was a disaster as the difference in weight was telling. Brook was stopped in the sixth round and suffered a broken right eye socket. He would then move back to 147 to face Errol Spence Jr. In his IBF title defense, he was stopped in the 11th round, as he suffered a broken orbital bone. That no longer left Brook as the same fighter.

“That was the first time that someone got in my head before a fight. I remember being in the hotel room thinking, ‘I’m fighting Golovkin…tonight.’ I honestly started to doubt myself. When he broke my eye, the surgeon said to me that one more big shot and I could’ve been blind and could’ve lost my eye, and that hit home big time. Those same feelings resurfaced when I boxed Errol Spence Jr,” Brook stated

But looking back, Brook did put on some memorable nights for British boxing fans. He may not have won multiple world titles, but he did make it at the elite level. There is no getting away from that. Find all the latest boxing news and MMA breaking updates on boxingnews.com.