Right Then, A Champion Puts His Hand Up
Right then. Denzel Bentley, the reigning WBO world middleweight champion, has publicly offered Conor Benn a crack at his belt.
Bentley is 22-3-1 with 18 knockouts. The Battersea man was elevated to full champion after taking the WBO interim title with a dominant night against Endry Saavedra in April. Benn is 25-2 and five days removed from being taken out in two rounds in Las Vegas.
And rather than dress it up, Bentley just said it:
“Although the public might not think he deserves another world title shot, in my eyes I feel like his profile is big enough for him to skip the queue. It's unfair but that's the sport we're in. Obviously it's beneficial for me, especially financially, so 100 per cent that's the fight I would take.”
That Is The Most Honest Thing Anyone Has Said This Month
Let's not beat around the bush. Champions do this all the time. What they normally do is wrap it in nonsense about the challenger's heart, his legacy, his throwback style, anything to avoid admitting the real reason is the gate.
Bentley did not bother. He said the public will think it is unfair, he said he agrees it is unfair, he said he is taking it because of what it pays, and he said it into a microphone at Sky Sports.
I have far more time for that than for the usual routine. He is a world champion who has had to grind for everything, he has been beaten three times and come back each time, and he has watched more marketable men be handed things he had to fight for. He is not going to pretend the sport works on merit.
And He Was Decent About It Too
The part that got less attention is the part that says most about the bloke:
“Firstly he needs to get himself right, well and fit. I think he should take a lot of time off and recover. I don't think there's any rush for him to get back into a boxing ring or even a gym. That weight cut was a fight in itself for him I think.”
A man angling for a career-best payday, telling the fighter he wants to share a ring with to go away for a long time and look after himself first. That is class, and it costs him something to say it.
Is It A Good Fight For Benn? No.
Here is where I get off the bus about this being Benn's best route.
Bentley is a genuine middleweight. Not a welterweight who has grown, not a man arriving at 160 from below — a proper 160-pounder who has lived there his whole career and beaten good fighters there. Eighteen knockouts in twenty-two wins is not a padded record either.
And he knows exactly what he has:
“I'm a lot bigger than him and I can punch. There were a lot of flaws in his game that night that I could exploit.”
He is right on both counts. The flaws Ryan Garcia found in two rounds in Las Vegas — the hands dropping, the head staying on the centre line, the willingness to trade with a man who punches harder — do not go away because Benn moves up a division. They get exposed by anybody with power and patience, and Bentley has both.
Yes, Benn will be a stronger, better-fuelled fighter at 160 than he has been at 147. That is real and it matters. But a properly fuelled Conor Benn with the same defensive habits is still a fighter walking into shots, just with more weight behind the ones coming back.
The Eubank Fight Makes More Sense
If Benn is coming to 160, the fight to have is the third Chris Eubank Jr fight. One apiece, a rivalry the entire country cares about, a stadium, and an opponent who is older, more worn and coming to the end rather than arriving in his prime.
The Bentley fight is a world title shot on paper and a beating in practice. The Eubank fight is a domestic occasion Benn can actually win.
Take the one you can win.
Luke's Verdict
Make no mistake, Denzel Bentley is a proper fighter who has been underrated his whole career and is about to be underrated again, because if this fight happens the entire build-up will be about the other man.
My call: this fight does not get made in 2027. Benn's people will look at Bentley, see a big, heavy-handed natural middleweight with a belt and very little downside risk for himself, and go looking for the Eubank money instead.
But if it does happen, I am not sitting on the fence: Bentley by stoppage inside nine. He is the bigger man, the harder puncher at the weight, and he has watched the same two rounds of tape everybody else has. Benn will have his moments early because he always does. Bentley will take him out in the second half.
More middleweight coverage on our news page, and the full card list is on the fight schedule.