Chris Eubank Jr says father ‘slept on stretcher in hospital’ after Conor Benn fight as bond grows

Chris Eubank Jr has opened up on how his relationship with his father, Chris Eubank Sr, has changed since last month’s fight with Conor Benn.

On 26 April, 32 years after Eubank Sr fought Nigel Benn for the second and final time, Jr outpointed Benn’s son Conor at Tottenham Hotspur Stadium. The scintillating fight followed a chaotic build-up, during which Nigel stood by his son while Eubank Sr called his own son a “disgrace”.

As such, it was a major surprise to see Eubank Sr arrive at the stadium with Jr on fight night, before the pair walked to the ring together.

Eubank Sr recently explained how he and Jr, who had been estranged for some time, reconnected the night before the fight, and Jr has now delved deeper into their latest chapter.

“Since that night before the fight, every day since then it’s been all love between me and my old man, which is incredible to think,” Eubank Jr said on Diary Of A CEO. “I was in hospital for two days after the fight; he didn’t leave the hospital.

“When I say he didn’t leave the hospital, I mean he’s sleeping on one of these stretchers outside my room, just in the hallway. That means everything to me. Regardless of the differences, and the things that have been said and done, a man who’s gonna stay by his son like that… That’s love.

“It’s been so long since I’ve had that type of feeling with him, and you only get one father. So, now we’re gonna build and build and build, and I think our relationship is only gonna get stronger and stronger and stronger.”

In the months before the fight, in which Eubank Jr handed Benn his first professional loss, Jr publicly took issue with his father creating distance between them, saying it was no way for the older Eubank to behave following the deaths of Sr’s son Sebastian and brother Simon Eubank in recent years.

“Regardless of what he said about me and about the fight, he was there when it mattered the most, and that means everything,” Eubank Jr said this week. “As soon as he picked the phone up, there was a tone in his voice that I hadn’t heard for years.

“It was a tone of happiness, lightness, joy. ‘Hey, how you doing, son? What’s going on? How you feeling? I know you’ve got a big day tomorrow, and… I wanna be there for you.’ I heard that, and I was like: ‘Is this a dream? This is Chris Eubank Sr I’m speaking to? Who is this?’

“I envisioned walking to the ring alone, being booed, and getting into that ring and fighting with anger in my heart. That’s what I thought that fight was gonna be. What it turned out to be was: I’m walking to the ring, my old man is behind me – is with me – and for the first time in my whole career, I’m walking through a crowd and there’s no boos […] I’m walking past people and I’m seeing tears in their eyes.”

After beating Benn 116-112 on all three scorecards, Eubank Jr was taken to hospital for surgery on a cut above his eye.

“There were moments in that hospital where I’m feeling… I caught myself in the mirror, I see my face is all puffed up, I’ve got this massive cut across my eye, my headache is crazy,” said the 35-year-old. “I’m feeling sorry for myself. ‘This is f****d up.’ I’ve got my family around me, some of them are crying, [I’m thinking:] ‘This is so bad.’

“I’m lying there, I’ve got my oxygen mask on, I can hear everything that’s going on. We’re in a ward, somebody gets wheeled into a room next to me. There’s no walls, it’s just sheets separating. ‘Get me the morphine, get me the morphine.’ They can’t get you the morphine until they sign off on some stuff, so I’m waiting there.

“Then I hear the doctors saying, ‘We have to operate on him now, otherwise he’s gonna die;’ I heard that from the other room, and I thought: ‘Oh, my God. I’m great. I’m blessed. I should not be feeling sorry for myself at all.’ I knew I was in pain, but there’s a guy next to me who’s about to die.”

It is expected that Eubank Jr and Benn, 28, will square off again later this year, possibly returning to Tottenham Hotspur Stadium for a rematch in September.

Eubank Jr has also been linked to a bout with super-middleweight king Saul “Canelo” Alvarez, though the Mexican icon will face Terence Crawford in September. Similarly, Benn has been linked to welterweight champion Mario Barrios, but the latter is due to fight a returning Manny Pacquiao in July.

In Benn’s fight with Eubank Jr, the former moved up two weights beyond his usual division of welterweight, meeting Jr at middleweight. The latter, however, was restricted by a rehydration clause.