Great match up. Domestic 1 and 2 fighting each other. Regional rivalry. Resurgence of a decent promoter (Hearn) who is on a mission to make the best fights possible. Chuck in a great undercard in Hope V Proksa, and a packed arena filled with heads who missed out on the original Naz days; bada bing. Its how you make great nights. ******s days are limited, that is a fact. Long live Matchroom.
Another connection is the darts crowd, as the Hearns have strong influence in advertising there too! The viewers of darts is very large.
The Hearns have been brilliant in the past few years with boxing from the Prizefighter which boomed for them and brought them back with a bang. Then signing up some classy fighters have helped them a lot from rival promotors it all added up for them. It seems they have some big ticket sellers on there hands in most places around the UK. Belfast is sorted with McCloskey at the moment but give it another year or so and Frampton could well be selling out the big arenas up there and with the backing of Matchroom its all good. The only area they are lacking a fighter a big ticket seller is up in Scotland and Wales. Matchroom have been a great positive for boxing and long may it continue.
Think The War Of The Roses title sold it for many. Chatting to people sat around me they we're from Leeds, Huddersfield, York etc and not just Sheffield. The chants on the night were all 'Yorkshire, Yorkshire' so seems the whole of Yorkshire was behind Kell. Leading up to the fight, Kell was on the back page of the Sheffield Star quite a bit (Sheff Star also sells in Rotherham, Barnsley, Chesterfield and Doncaster) and was on Radio Sheffield (which has a similar coverage to Sheffield Star) so this would have contributed. Another factor is there hasnt been any boxing at Sheffield Arena for donkeys years so the casual fans turned out in force.
One thing I found interesting was that the Hearn's even had Brook on BBC last year, doing some trick shots on the snooker. Of course, with the Crucible connection I thought it was very clever. Expect the same this year. There's lots to work with with Kell. New Naz angle, Sheffield/Yorkshire angle, unbeaten etc.
its plain and simple, eddie hearn promoted the fight and got it out there, most promoters are lazy and cant be arsed to promote they just think they have to make a good fight and people will come, it doesnt work like that anymore, theres a big difference between having a promoter and being promoted, most fighters myself included have a promoter, not many of us are being promoted just put on shows with very little promotion and hoping for the best, its plain and simple promoters are not doing there jobs right, eddie hearn is new in the game and is right up for it and hes doing his job properly
As mentioned already, they made this feel like an event. Something not to be missed. Us Brits are territorial. The moniker of “best in Britain” carries weight. It gets people interested. Im the only proper boxing fan in my office. Ive had various people coming up and asking me about Brook, and could he be as good as Hamad etc etc. These are people that never showed an interest in boxing before, but they are sport fans. If SSN are hyping the fight, & adverts hyping the fight, it makes people stand up and take notice. I truly believe that people who don’t follow boxing but follow “sport” – would like to follow boxing but don’t, because it’s such a difficult sport to keep up to date with…. The viewing figures for ITV & C5 proves that the general public love boxing, if they can access it easier. So going back to Hatton v Brook. They made it easy for those people with Sky to feel the need to tune in. Programme starts at 8pm, main event for the best in Britain is on at 10:30… Mention Brooks name in the same breath as Nassem Hamed. Job done!
I agree' I allways thought it' Brook just has a look ' like cotto you just know he is a real fighter. Carn't put my finger on it' a kind of ora. No homo
I thought that; he could be a great world champion...until he opens his mouth. Although isn't that the norm for most of our British champs, except usually it's because they're utter twats (see Khan, Haye, Naz etc).