Chris Eubank Jr insists that a showdown with unified and Ring Magazine super middleweight champion, Saul ‘Canelo’ Alvarez, remains high on his agenda but that his upcoming fight with Conor Benn is arguably bigger than a fight with the pound-for-pound great.
Eubank Jr (34-3, 25 KOs), is less than three weeks away from his middleweight grudge match with Benn (23-0, 14 KOs) and the 35-year-old isn’t allowing himself to be distracted by talk of future opponents.
The Ring Magazine event will take place at London’s Tottenham Hotspur Stadium and will be streamed globally by DAZN.
Turki Alalshikh, the head of Riyadh Season and chairman of Saudi Arabia’s General Entertainment Authority, has stated that the winner of the grudge match will put themselves in line for a fight with the Mexican superstar.
That is an idea that Eubank Jr’s father, Chris Snr, is fully behind.
The former middle and super-middleweight world champion has always been outspoken in his belief that his son shouldn’t be sharing the ring with Benn. He believes that the only way Jr can cement his legacy is by testing himself against ‘Canelo’.
“I do think that is a next logical fight and this fight, Turki is saying, can put me in a position to get in the ring with ‘Canelo’ which would be amazing so I agree with him on that,” Eubank Jr said during an interview on the Ariel Helwani Show.
“That doesn't mean that I shouldn't fight Conor. He thinks that ‘Canelo’ is the only guy I should fight and that's not how boxing works.”
The stoic Eubank Sr has a strong belief in the way that fighters should carry themselves both inside and outside of the ring.
Given the events of the past two-and-a-half years, the rivalry between Eubank Jr and Benn has gone beyond a battle for family pride but, for Eubank Sr, the challenge of facing the world’s best super-middleweight should supersede what initially was a manufactured feud.
Eubank Jr grew up watching the way his father operated but has made his own name in an era that places a high value on controversy and publicity.
A career-defining fight with ‘Canelo’ remains a priority for Eubank Jr but beating Benn allows him to capitalise on an entirely different market in the meantime.
“This is a fight that the fans are demanding. They have been demanding it for years. This fight is bigger than boxing. It’s mainstream in the UK,” Eubank Jr said.
“In the UK, it's probably bigger than a ‘Canelo’ fight because the general public don't know who ‘Canelo’ is. The boxing fans do but the general public don't because the general public aren't boxing fans. They don't know anything about boxing. This is a fight where you've got kids, you’ve got grandmas, you’ve got people that don't know or care about boxing at all and they are going to be at that fight.
“This is a very special thing we have here so people ask me about what I'm going to do next, I have no interest in even thinking about it because this fight is so huge for me and I cannot wait to get in that ring.”