Via Charles Brun: Advertiser Eddie Hearn is still eager to do a showdown between Chris Eubank Jr and Conor Benn despite Benn’s positive drug test in a VADA test.
Hearn asserted that Benn (21-0, 14 KOs) was allowed to fight and was not suspended after testing positive for clomifene. However, The backlash that Hearn & Matchroom will receive from the boxing public if he rescheduled the Eubank-Benn fight would be huge.
Hearn needs to think clearly before making the decision to postpone the match because if he does, he will be criticized a lot.
It’s fair to say that there will be a dark cloud following Benn wherever he goes, and it would be wise for Hearn not to attempt to reschedule the game until Conor gets a few wins.
The problem that Hearn had was The question is whether Benn has the talent to beat the top heavyweights like Jaron ‘Boots’ Ennis, Vergil Ortiz Jr and Keith Thurman. Having seen Benn fight many times, I don’t give him any chance to beat any of them, and of course, not with Errol Spence Jr or Terence Crawford.
It would be a frenzy for talented weightlifters if Hearn threw Benn into the ring with them.
Also you cannot move Benn up to 154 because he will be slaughtered by top boxers like Sebastian Fundora, Jermell Charlo, Tim Tszyu and Tony Harrison. Benn was too small and limited to fight those fighters.
Hearn can’t keep shuffling washed-up fighters into the ring with Benn to rebuild his name because fans will clearly see it.
He had to match Benn with quality fighters like Boots Ennis, Ortiz, Thurman, or even David Avanesyan, a fighter he didn’t enjoy fighting at all.
Chances are if Hearn were to play Conor Benn against Ennis or any other talented candidate at 147th, he would lose to them. Once that happens, the money Benn faithfully puts into Matchroom will dry up like an exhausted oil well.
“I feel like the right decision has been made. I feel like people in the sport will feel like the right decision has been made,” Eddie Hearn told Boxing DAZN about the postponement of the fight between Chris Eubank Jr and Conor Benn.
“We went ahead with the decision to try to make this war happen if that was the right thing to do. At some point you have to take down the tools and say, ‘We have to make the right decision here.’
“While we feel the board has not made some of the correct decisions in this process, we also understand the bigger picture. Had a lot of conversations with Wasserman and Chris Eubank Jr, and he wanted to fight.
“I was in his room 45 minutes ago. He was three pounds overweight, ready to weigh in tomorrow. He was going to gain weight, and he was disappointed.
“The one thing he wants more than anything right now is to fight Conor Benn and do a quest for him, but I believe we will see that. It’s been a big fight, but as he said, ‘Everything has to be right’, and that’s the process we’re going to take now.
“For now, this fight is on hold. The ticket be refunded. The show is off. It’s also not good for the bottom card. When you have a fare reflected on the main event and not a fare below, and you offer a full refund, it’s one price or another.
“You let people come in without a refund, or you give everyone a refund and cancel the show. All the fighters in the lower card will be rescheduled in the next few days according to their date.
“We move forward. We try to make this fight; Chris Eubank wants this fight to happen. Conor Benn clearly wants to make this fight happen, and that’s the point. We’ll go through the process and make sure everyone feels comfortable and right.
Conor Benn is clear to fight
“Final, he’s clear to fight. Instead of jumping over a loophole to make this fight go through the courts, we wanted to make sure everyone was comfortable,” Hearn said when asked where Conor Benn was going from here.
