I was watching boxer Nick Blackwell receive serious head injuries when he fought Chris Eubank Junior (GDN, March 28). It’s high time boxing was banned.
When I did my National Service in the REME in the mid-Fifties, I was in a camp of more than 1,000 troops near Taunton in Somerset, England.
I was always keen on sport and fairly strong, and my mate persuaded me to enter the boxing competition. Selected to represent B Company at middleweight, I got a bye in the quarter-finals and won the semi-final by a technical KO.
Going into the final, I’d never felt so scared. In the event, I hit my opponent in the first round and I can still see him now. His arms dropped by his sides, his eyes went back so just the whites showed and he fell on his back.
The blow was so severe that he didn’t come round until he was back in the dressing room.
The thought of this and the possibility that my opponent could have suffered permanent brain damage makes me feel sick. And they call it a sport.
Now, I can’t bear any form of boxing: I consider it barbaric, trying to knock the living daylights out of each other.
Fred Turton
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