Alan Minter, 1951-2020

FOR a six-month period in 1980 Alan Minter was the only undisputed world champion in any weight division. That fact alone should have been enough to guarantee Minter, who sadly died from cancer on September 10 aged 69, a prominent place on boxing’s podium of immortality. But it never quite panned out that way for the handsome and likeable man from Crawley. For just as football chose to abandon Minter’s good friend and regular drinking partner Bobby Moore, so boxing was often guilty of failing to acknowledge the boxer’s not inconsiderable ring achievements.

One of the last times that I saw