Eubank Jr’s Dilemma: Cash Grab against Brook or Championship Challenge Fighting Janibek?

Image: Eubank Jr's Dilemma: Cash Grab against Brook or Championship Challenge Fighting Janibek?
BEN SHALOMíS BOXXER UNLEASHED 19/02/23 MANCHESTER CENTRE PIC LAWRENCE LUSTIG/BOXXER PRESS CONFERENCE MIDDLEWEIGHT CONTEST CHRIS EUBANK JR v LIAM SMITH
By Charles Brun - 02/28/2024 - Comments

Chris Eubank Jr’s promoter, Kalle Sauerland, is negotiating for a possible against former welterweight world champion Kell Brook and unified IBF/WBO middleweight champ Janibek Alimkhanuly.

TalkSPORT Boxing reports that Kalle is in talks with Brook and Janibek’s people to set up a fight for Eubank Jr., who is coming off a tenth-round TKO win over Liam Smith in their September rematch. It’s easy to predict which direction Eubank Jr. will go for his next fight.

He’ll avoid the dangerous fight against the unbeaten Janibek and opt for the easy money against the long-in-the-tooth Brook for a domestic clash to make a little coin from nostalgic British fans.

Fan Sentiment Leans Toward Janibek

Fans on social media overwhelmingly want to see #2 WBO, #3 WBC, and #9 WBA Eubank Jr. challenge Janibek (15-0, 10 KOs) for his two 160-lb titles. He’s a young world champion and is considered by some as the best fighter in the middleweight division.

It would be a significant step up in class for Eubank Jr. to go from fighting at the British level against Liam Smith and Liam Williams to facing Janibek for world title honors, but he’s got to make the move at some point.

Eubank Jr. will be turning 35 in September, and he’s only fought one world-class opponent during his career, George Groves in 2018 and he lost to him.

You can’t count an old 35-year-old Liam Smith or one-armed James DeGale as world-class, as those guys were past it when Eubank Jr. fought them. They were no longer relevant fighters when those fights took place.

Brook: Faded Glory or Easy Payday?

The 37-year-old inactive Brook (40-3, 28 KOs) is viewed as washed up and not the fighter he once was before Gennadiy Golovkin wrecked his promising career by stopping him in the fifth round in 2016.

With that said, even the faded version of Brook would have an excellent chance of beating the 34-year-old Eubank Jr. (33-3, 24 KOs), as he’s on the decline and has been mostly operating at the British level in his career, content to fight non-world class opposition for easy paydays rather than take risky fights against world-class opposition at 160 and 168.