APRIL SHOWER
AT the start of April 2001, it would be no exaggeration to say Great Britain boasted the best heavyweight in the world, the best featherweight in the world, and two of the biggest stars in boxing in the shape of Lennox Lewis and “Prince” Naseem Hamed.
Lewis, at that stage, was WBC and IBF heavyweight champion, and Hamed, despite relinquishing his WBO featherweight title, was widely regarded the best nine-stone fighter in the game and arguably one of the hardest punchers his division had ever seen.
They were big names, the likes of which rarely emerge in isolation, let alone together, but were also two men with targets on their backs who were that April preparing for fights that would, unbeknown to them, play a major part in defining their legacies.
On April 7, 2001, Hamed fought Marco Antonio Barrera, a former WBO super-bantamweight champion, in Las Vegas, while two weeks later Lewis defended his heavyweight titles against unheralded American Hasim Rahman in South Africa.
Spoiler one: within a fortnight two British world champions would become zero, proving that, as far as British boxing is concerned, when it rains, it pours. Spoiler two: for one of the dethroned British boxing superstars this April
