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The Morning Star 2026 Conference
‘Sometimes insanity is all a man has left’
This is an abridged extract from John’s book This Boxing Game: A Journey in Beautiful Brutality , now available online at Pitch Publishing and all major booksellers.

THE circumstances in which I found myself in the ring for the first time were strange to say the least. 

It was the summer of 1994 and I was working in Brussels. Out for a stroll with a colleague one particularly hot evening, we happened upon a funfair spread out almost the entire length of a large park. 

The place was crowded and with nothing better to do, we decided to take a look. At the far end of the fair we came to a boxing booth. 

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