KELL BROOK admits defeat to Amir Khan will leave his head hanging in shame for the rest of his days.
Britain’s 35-year-old pair of former world champions finally clash on Saturday after a decade of spiteful, personal insults that have, at times, crossed the usual trash-talk line.
But former IBF welterweight king Brook, a proud son of Sheffield, admits in a rare sombre moment that losing to his Bolton nemesis will condemn him to a life of Northern misery.
He said: “Defeat to Amir Khan is unthinkable for me because it has been talked about so much and for so long.
“I would have to walk around with my head down for the rest of my life.
“He knows there is a lot of pressure on this fight because of the long build-up.
“This is for the best in Britain, Khan vs Brook is the one, bragging rights to the maximum.”
Brook’s once brilliant career has been on the slide since he bulked up to middleweight for a crack at Gennady Golovkin in 2016.
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The Kazakhstan knockout artist, then a much-avoided 35-0 monster, shattered Brook’s right eye socket meaning trainer Dominic Ingle threw in the towel after five rounds.
Sickeningly his comeback fight – a defence of his welterweight world title against brick-fisted Errol Spence Jr – ended in an almost identical way but with the left orbital bone smashed instead.
Brook’s face has been rebuilt with titanium but ruthless Khan reckons all the steel in Sheffield won’t be able to save his long-time foe.
He sneered: “I am the A-side because I am the better fighter.
“I have got everything he hasn’t, the better looks, the speed, the power.
“We might not be the best at taking shots but that is the same for the both of us.
“His eye sockets are not going to help, he might think he is a bad man now because he has Sheffield steel in his face but I will still smash that up.
“I will stand in the ring and have a war with him, 100 per cent. He’s half broken already so he is not going to last the distance.”
Brook’s 2014 world title win over Shawn Porter – in the 32-0 American’s backyard – is one of the most underrated away wins of any modern Brit fighter.
And he revealed Khan’s refusal to acknowledge the feat is one of the main reasons he has chased this clash for so long and has boiled down to the catchweight 149lbs limit.
He said: “I will admit that he has a bigger profile than me but he is not the better fighter. He is not a better fighter than me. Now I have this fight I want to get some things off my chest.
“I give him his respect but, at the start of my career, I have been the first one on the card, the last one when people are walking out, I have had to do it the hard way.
“I got to my mandatory position the hard way and then I went to America to win it and I still get no respect from him.
“We both have to control our aggression in the ring but then we will go to war, the gameplan might even go out of the window.”
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