ROY JONES JR revealed Chris Eubank Jr was in good spirits after his loss to Liam Smith – with a rematch already on his mind.
Eubank was stunned in defeat to Smith in Manchester, hitting the deck twice before being stopped in four rounds.
It was the first time the middleweight had ever been put down in his professional career, causing shockwaves across the sport.
Eubank’s pre-fight boast of being able to beat Smith at just 50 per cent of his ability came back to haunt him in devastating fashion.
But the son of British boxing royalty amazingly found the funny side of it when he was consoled by his coach.
Jones told iFL TV: “To be perfectly honest with you, he’s taken it better than I did!
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“Taking it totally better than I did, he was like, ‘OK, I guess 50 per cent didn’t work, I guess I’ll come back at 75.’
“And that’s funny because he’s still joking, he’s still having a good time, so he understands, this is boxing and when you fight the best boxers in the world like that and challenge all comers, this might happen.”
Jones’ cloak of invincibility famously vanished in 2004 when he was knocked out for the first time, by Antonio Tarver.
The American icon went on to lose four more times by KO as he fought into his 50s.
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Eubank’s famous father Sr claimed to have never even seen his son buckled in the ring as he tweeted out congratulations to Smith.
But Jones – a former four-division champion who is now considered one of the all time greats – insisted it happens to the best of them.
He said: “I just told him, ‘Hey, it’s happens.’
“We have times in the gym, we have talks in the gym, we have things that we do and until that happens there’s certain things it’s going to be hard for a coach to say to a fighter.
“Like I told him, I’d rather a body shot to a head shot. He say, ‘No, I’m the other way round, I’d rather get hit with a head shot than a body shot.’
“Well, he’s never been hurt to the head, so of course he’s going to think that. He’s not going to say anything different because he’s never been down from a head shot.
“Now, he understands what I mean from that because I’ve experienced that, now he can see what I was talking about.”
Eubank does have the chance to gain redemption due to a rematch clause in his contract.
And both fighters have opened the door to a sequel at Anfield.
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Jones revealed Eubank is up for a second fight but admitted it may not be immediately.
He said: “I don’t know if he goes straight back into it but I do know he wants it.”
Source: Boxing - thesun.co.uk
