Kell Brook – Britain’s Biggest Prospect?

By Adam Fillingham: Kell Brook the current British welterweight champion won his British title out right, after his third defence on July the 18Th, in sensational style against the tough Prizefighter winner Michael Lomax. Since then, Kell has been touted as one of Britain’s biggest boxing prospects and matched up to the highly thought of, British legend, Naseem Hamad.

Kell Brook if you don’t know him was born in Sheffield, Yorkshire of the United Kingdom, in 1986, making him twenty three years old. He is a classy Orthodox fighter although he does tend to switch hit and stands at 5′ 9″ in height.

Kell first fought professionally at the age of 19. The fight came against Peter Buckley (the man who lost 256 fights before retiring) who had at the time lost 189 fights. Brook won the fight on points after six rounds.

Up until his British title shot against Barrie Jones on June the 14Th 2008 for the vacant belt, ‘Kid’ Kell was spoon fed a lot of opponents to feed on and sensationally knocked out nine of the sixteen opponents he faced.

The on June the 14Th promoter Frank Warren set up a fight between undefeated Kell Brook and a tough, game, Barrie Jones for the vacant belt. Jones had just lost for the Welsh version of the British belt just one fight earlier, so was looking to impress. Kell took the fight in his stride and was unfazed by the step up in opposition and wore down and eventually had the bout stopped by the referee.

Having won not only won his 17Th consecutive fight but also becoming the British champion, Brook defended his belt just 5 months later against an in form Kevin McIntyre, in Glasgow many miles away from home. McIntyre was in form, winning 4 on the bounce and was obviously confident but Brook was just too classy. Kell went on too knock the Scot out in the first round. This was the fight to give Brook the hype he has today.

Just two months later from his destruction of McIntyre Brook travelled to the great York Hall in London. The opponent in front of him this time was the out of form Stuart Elwell. Elwell had lost 3 of his last 5 fights so Kell was once again the favourite. Nobody expected Brook to perform as well as he did though. In knocking Elwell out in two rounds he proved that his hype large hype could well be justified. His accurate right hands worked well and hit the target so many times knocking Elwell onto the canvas many times in the two rounds the bout lasted. Brook proved that he has power in both hand with his left jab packing a lot of power as well as his strong right hand. His speed too was too much for Elwell to handle and his snapping shots were too much for the aging challenger.

Six months after once again destroying another challenger, Brook traveled up to the M.E.N arena in Manchester. His challenger was Michael Lomax the welterweight prizefighter winner. Looking well muscled as he normally does Brook looked confident as he entered the ring, knowing if he defeated his thirty one year old Challenger he would keep his British belt outright. With pretty much ease Kell stopped Lomax in the third round after Dave Parris stepped in to stop the action. Once again Brook looked quick and yet powerful with both hands and used his jab more often. He switched from head to body quickly and went in for the kill when he knew he hurt his opponent.

These fights have fueled his growing fan base to increase the hype going that he will one day become world champion. One the evidence that I have seen in his recent fights I will have too agree with them but one question remains….

Is he that good, or are the calibre opponents making him look good? That question will hopefully be answered in the near future.

*note* Kell Brook is in talks with Micheal Jennings for a fight as the last fight fell threw when Brook injured himself.

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