The British Boxing Board of Control (BBBofC) has come under fire after footage of the alleged obstruction of an ambulance while Chris Eubank Jr. dealt with dehydration surfaced. The incident occurred after Eubank’s win over Conor Benn on April 25th at the Tottenham Hotspur Stadium and saw a 20-minute delay occur that might have resulted in more lethal consequences.
Suffering from dehydration, Eubank eventually managed to reach the hospital but during last month’s launch presser for his upcoming November 15 fight against Conor Benn, the British middleweight (160 lbs) made sure to mention the hypocrisy of the BBBofC in investigating his social media posts but sparing nothing to investigate the ambulance’s obstruction:
“The board, the British Boxing Board of Control, they opened several investigations into some of the things I did in the lead up to the fight,” Eubank told attendants at the September 17th launch press conference for Eubank Jr-Benn II.
“No investigations, by the way, into why my ambulance was stopped from leaving the stadium for 20 minutes, but I guess trying to find out why I was talking about being in a sauna before the fight is more important.“
The BBBofC notably fined Chris Eubank Jr. £10,000 for prior to the first Eubank Jr-Benn bout for misleading the public through social media videos that he was cutting weight through sauna’s ― with the use of sauna’s for weight cutting being prohibited by the board.
The video of the obstruction, released by Chris Eubank on social media, did depict the ambulance being blocked but did not verify for how long. However, the footage does confirm that there was clear obstruction that warrants an investigation.
Given the incident happened all the way back in April, the BBBofC’s credibility and reputation has taken a palpable hit with no action surrounding this obstruction having been taken since.
The venue owners of Tottenham Hotspur Stadium are also under question due to the incident that occurred and no feasible explanation for why an ambulance was blocked, if temporarily, having ever surfaced.
In addition, questions have arisen on whether Matchroom ― who promoted Eubank’s rival, Conor Benn ― did not have influence in the proceedings out of spite, though there is no concrete evidence confirming their role in the incident.
