Bunce Tweeted that he passed away, but BN Editor later Tweeted the he is alive and well in a nursing home in Yorkshire
Wow, Thats strange - random thought popped into my head earlier about just how classy Kirkland Lang was - but just how Colin Jones was the type of guy who always would have his number. But I was thinking - this guy is one of the classiest and talented guys to watch - but he pissed his life away in the end. Sad news - but he had sunken low for years - long gone from the glory days of yesteryear.
Couldn't believe when I sawe this on a thread last night. No coverage anywhere of note.What a sad indictment of Kirkland's whole life it is. I'm old enough and lucky enough to have seen him on the box when he showed glimpses of that phenomenal talent. So sad that the pipe was always his master though. I hope the pain is over champ.It might have been brief but you were one of the finest from these shores.God bless and safe trip.
Yeh its about 10 miles from me and quite often go there in the summer. Couple of lads I play cricket with no him and apparently he is like a tramp if he's ever out and about. Years of drugs and alcohol have frazzled his brain and body.
Back then a world title actually meant something. You could be a very good fighter, like Kirkland and not be world champ whereas today you only need to be roughly British level and you can have a relatively meaningless "world title" trinket land in your lap. If Kirkland Laing still followed boxing, I wonder how he would feel about the likes of Nathan Cleverly (amongst others) enjoying success as a "world champ" when in reality not having half the talent he had. This isn't a dig at Clev, BTW, it's just an observation of boxing today compared to back then.
Same as Colin Jones , ****ing spewing i bet but then again i doubt Cleve goes on a six month bender every other year
the thing is Clev would probably be a world champion back then, and Laing never would be, Clev works very hard trains very hard and is a good fighter, Laing was just an ok fighter that was talented with flashes of brilliance, but was lazy, chinny , and sometimes looked so ****, BUt what if Laing did train and dedicate himself like Clev, I am sure he would have been a great and a world champ, but in the end he didn't
Do you reckon? The champs back in 82 were Mike Spinks and Mathew Saad Muhammed. No disrespect to Clev meant.
Correctly stated Laing had no one to blame but himself dedication wise an absolute nightmare would go missing for long periods but was still ability ise very talented.Talented enough to be avoided by world class operators not willing to take the risk on a focused Laing facing them. Showing my age but Cleverly versus Spinks/ M S Muhammed he would have been beaten soundly by both. Al we can also add John Conteh into the mix he would have done an absolute number on Nathan Cleverly imo.