REAL FESTIVAL OF BOXING

@BigDaddyBunce

Voice of boxing

IN 1998 I saw an odd and telling handwritten sign in an old bar at a fight hotel where I was staying: ‘Moet $50’. Simple and to the point.

There was nothing unusual or exceptional about paying 50 bucks for a bottle of champagne in 1998, but the hotel was in Liverpool city centre and for the fifth-year running, the Russians with wads of dollars and long fur coats had taken over the great fight city. I was tempted to say invaded. Incidentally, the Russian and Ukraine contingents held up the bar each and every