BY MATT BOZEAT
AFTER a hard few months, Glenn McCrory is smiling again.
‘Carrying David,’ the uplifting story of how McCrory’s terminally ill brother inspired him to win the world title, looks to be on its way to the big screen.
“We are very close to getting it made now,” said the former IBF cruiserweight champion, cleared of any wrong-doing recently after a lengthy court case.
“I’ve had two days of meetings about the film the other week.
“We need to find a bit more funding and then we are there. We hope to start filming in February.”
McCrory has taken a break from commentary, explaining: “I just need to focus on this for a while.
“It’s been a rocky road down and this is my way back up.”
He has said ‘Carrying David’ is “more of a ‘Rocky’ story than ‘Rocky itself’ and fair to say everyone who has read his autobiography or watched the stage adaptation of his story will have been touched by its warmth.
“There had never been a world champion – or even a world-title challenger – from the North East before,” said McCrory, who celebrates his 60th birthday this month.
“For me, the biggest reason was, the area is football mad. Unless you come from here, it’s hard to understand the passion there is for Newcastle United and Sunderland Football Clubs. Football overshadows everything.
“The first professional boxing show I went to I was on the bill!
“There were shows in the North East, but they never made any headlines. It was always football, football, football . . .
“I started off as a heavyweight – and I was never a heavyweight. It was so tough. I lost fights and was written off when I was 20. That just made me more determined to succeed. That tough start helped me.
“But because I wasn’t with a big promoter, it was hard to get pushed along.”
McCrory went to the States to spar Mike Tyson and remembered: “I blacked his eye and that got me more publicity than any fight!
“Mike Marley put it all over the back page of the New York Post about this big Irishman who had bashed Mike Tyson. It was an exaggeration – but that was fine by me!”
McCrory returned home and started pushing his career along from the right-hand side of the bill.
“Frank Warren was trying to build up Andy Straughan, but I beat him, then Chisanda Mutti for the Commonwealth title and Tee Jay,” he said.
“I wasn’t the favourite in any of these fights. I was always up against it.
“I got a ‘phone call from Cedric Kushner and he told me: ‘You’ve got your world-title fight – but it’s against [Patrick] Lumumba.’
“He had around 300 amateur fights, lost six or seven and the only reason he didn’t have more pro fights was because nobody would fight him.
“I knew he had sparred Mike Tyson and done well.
“He was telling everyone before he fought me that after he’d beaten me and defended the cruiserweight title a few times, he was going after Tyson. That’s how confident he was.
“For a while, we thought the fight was going to be abroad. Then they looked at venues in Newcastle and Whitley Bay ice rink – and then the local council came forward and said they would put some money towards the fight.
“There was zero employment in the area, it was the biggest black spot in the UK, and they thought having a big fight in Stanley would lift everyone. That was unheard of. They wanted the fight in my village, at the leisure centre 200 yards from where I lived!”
The fight was booked for the Louisa Centre in Stanley for June, 1989.
“For the first time, I had a proper training camp,” said McCrory. “I was in great shape – and was going to need to be.
“[The Sun boxing correspondent] Colin Hart was my biggest fan. He said I had the best left hook since Henry Cooper – and even he said I would lose!
“The headline on the morning of the fight was: ‘Glenn’s a Goner.’
“I went to see my missus at the time and my kid, kissed them goodbye, put my bag over my shoulder and went 200 yards up the road to fight for the world title!
“I remember seeing blokes wearing dickie bows and TV trucks and thinking: ‘What the fuck is going on?’ That’s when I started to realise the enormity of it.
“The capacity was supposed to be 1,700 – but I reckon there were a thousand more in there. It was jam-packed – and noisy.
“Ian Darke commentated on the fight for BBC radio and he still says it was one of the best atmospheres he’s ever experienced.
“My priest came to see me in the dressing room and I was sh***ing myself. It felt like I was going to the gallows. He was a huge favourite.
“The dressing room door opened and the noise just hit me! I remember thinking: ‘F***ing hell, they don’t think I’m going to lose!’
“[Coach] Beau [Williford] told me: ‘Box him, he’s dangerous, he can punch’ – but the tactics went out of the window!
“The way Lumumba acted when he was introduced won me the fight.
“He walked to the centre of the ring, dropped his hands by his sides and shrugged his shoulders. He looked so confident. He was saying: ‘This title is mine’ – or that’s how I felt at the time. At that moment, I lost my nerves. I just thought: ‘I’m going to smash your face in.’
“I hit him with a left hook in the first round and he hung onto my leg. If he had gone down, I don’t think he would have got up.
“I kept hitting him with left hook after left hook and he kept taking them – and then he started coming back.
“By the seventh and eighth rounds, he had recovered. I remember him stepping to the side and hitting me with two right hands and my ear drum went pop! I started to have doubts – and the crowd got behind me, tried to lift me.
“I looked over the ropes and my disabled brother David was there. He was supposed to be at home, but there he was at ringside in his wheelchair waving his arms around and cheering his brother on. That gave me strength. I just thought: ‘Come on, dig deep.’
“Around the 10th round, I knew I had him. He had given up, his body was sagging.
“There were some tough rounds for me and, if the fight had been somewhere else, I might have lost. But in Stanley, on that night, I really believe I would have beaten anyone in the world. I had an army behind me and I felt unstoppable.
“I went to bed that night knowing I had proved everyone wrong. Even my family had told me for years: ‘Don’t get your hopes up, Glenn.’
“I had done it, I was a world champion – and I never felt the same about the sport after that.”
McCrory, who lost the belt in his second defence to Jeff Lampkin after a battle with the scales and went on to fight Lennox Lewis up at heavyweight, said: “I had never thought about what came after winning the world title.
“I never thought about defending it and if I could have retired after I beat Lumumba, I would have done. But I got paid £7,500 for the fight – and then had to give a chunk of that away to my manager and trainer.
“But I did have civic receptions and dinners in my honour, an open-top bus tour – and I was mobbed in Middlesbrough. Women kept asking me to sign their breasts – and I had to oblige! That was my public and I had to keep them happy!
“I watch the tape back now [of the Lumumba fight] and [ITV Sport presenter] Dickie Davies says afterwards: ‘Next week, we will be in Las Vegas for the rematch between Sugar Ray Leonard and Thomas Hearns.’
“I laugh when I hear that, but that was the sort of company I was keeping in those days!”
