Chris Eubank Jr Wants Canelo Alvarez And Conor Benn ‘Within The Next 12 Months’
Middleweight contender Chris Eubank Jr says he is targeting “mega fights” with Saul ‘Canelo’ Alvarez and long-time rival Conor Benn over the next 12 months.
Eubank (33-3-0 24 KO) will end more than one year of inactivity when he returns to the ring to fight Kamil Szeremeta (25-2-2 8 KO) on October 14 on the undercard of the undisputed light-heavyweight fight between Artur Beterbiev and Dimitrii Bivol in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia.
The British fighter’s last bout was in September last year when he avenged his fourth-round stoppage loss to domestic rival Liam Smith by knocking out the Liverpudlian in the 10th round of the rematch.
“I want to get back into the swing of things and make these mega fights over the next 12 months,” Eubank Jr told the BBC Radio 5 Live Boxing podcast.
Eubank had been in negotiations to fight unified super-middleweight champion Canelo next, but the Mexican opted for Edgar Berlanga, whom he fights in Las Vegas on September 14. The 34-year-old insists he didn’t back out of the opportunity to challenge Alvarez but would rather get some fights under his belt before taking on the pound-for-pound superstar.
“There were discussions, but we couldn’t come to terms on the business side of things. I’ve been out of the ring for 12 months – I wasn’t looking to fight Canelo for a payday,” he said. “I want to beat this guy. Get me some nice solid fights over the next six months and then I’ll take him out in May.”
Benn, on the other hand, represents a different target for Eubank. The pair were booked to fight in October 2022, taking a family rivalry into a new generation following the epic wars contested by fathers Nigel Benn and Chris Eubank Sr at the start of the 1990s (Eubank won the first before the rematch was drawn).
With Benn a natural welterweight and Eubank a middleweight, the bout was agreed at a 157lb catchweight – a weight that Eubank tortured himself to make despite health warnings from his famous father.
Three days before the fight, it was revealed that Benn had failed a drug test and while both fighters were happy to proceed as Benn had yet to receive a provisional suspension, the British Boxing Board of Control refused to license the bout and it was canceled.
While Benn has spent much of the past three years challenging his various suspensions and the fight does not appear close, Eubank said the “chapter is not closed”, but warned his rival that any leverage he might have once had is gone.
“I imagine it’s going to happen in the next 12 months. As soon as he gets his license back and his career back on track, that fight will happen,” Eubank Jr said. “[Benn] has no say in anything now. He’s lost all his privileges. You can’t fail a drug test and come back and say ‘I still want weight clauses and rehydration clauses’.
“Now you take what you get. Now you’re the bad guy. “Now it’s not just about how our dads fought. Now we have our own beef. We have our own story. We have our own history.”
