Is Gavin on Wa rrens books? I noticed the comment about his trainer not been after money if Gavin hadnt been paid on time, i know this is a claim levelled at Wa rren but would be interesting if it was another promoter.
I think he is a typical mainstream writer in relation to Boxing, has the same narrative as everyone else.
His writing is very fact based that regurgitates stereotypes or already widely held beliefs. It is symptomatic of any BBC sports writer as they are jack of all trades, masters of none.
Ben Dirs is good writer, especially on cricket, but his boxing articles always have the tone of a casual fan, or a former fan now jaded with the sport. This article was good though. I have some sympathy for Gavin and DeGale, especially for DeGale being booed on his debut and Gavin for his problems outside of the ring. Both have been criminally inactive since turning pro, and you have to hold their promoter responsible for that. They've also been mismanaged by the same man IMO. DeGale was being portrayed as such an ass and Gavin's career seemed to be spiraling out of of control. But they also need to take some of the responsibility themselves. It sounds like fighters are too coddled under the Team GB setup, which doesn't seem to set them up for the reality of the pros.
Degale pretends he's not a ****.... but every so often, you just get a little glimmer of just how much of a **** he is. And he is a massive ****. Thats why people turned away from him, same with Khan. Maybe the English should just calm down on the enormous hype before a fighter has achieved anything in the sport. They just set the fighter up to fall, and they nearly always do.
One of Ben Dirs better efforts on boxing. His boxing article are generally populist and lightweight. A boxing fan can generally pick holes in what he says fairly easily. As a poster above said he is a jack of all trades and not a boxing specialist. In saying all that I think he can write well and his articles have a good flow to them.