why is it my fellow brits love losers, boxers like frank bruno, henry cooper etc who failed miserably against top american boxers go on to win top british awards like sports personality of the year etc yet genuine world champs like joe calzaghe get no recognation whatsoever.to give an another examble although he is not a boxer soccer star wayne rooney is idolised in britain yet when he plays against top countrys he is really crap and gets sent off etc we have a bafferling mentality.
This isn't a soccer forum and I don't want to make it into one, but Rooney is probably the best athlete to come from your country in quite a while. He's also a big-game performer so he was an odd choice for the threadstarter to make his point with. I don't see what tyhe criticism is.
wayne rooney is good but a michael owen he is not
cooper knocked ali down and was then hammered by ali and if it was not for the cuts he would have been destroyed bruno was muscle bound ask amercan fight fans who thet would pay to see cooper and bruno or lewis and calzaghe obviously lewis and calzaghe.
This isn't a soccer forum and I don't want to make it into one, but Rooney is probably the best athlete to come from your country in quite a while. He's also a big-game performer so he was an odd choice for the threadstarter to make his point with. I don't see what tyhe criticism is.
Rooney is a bit shit really.
This isn't a soccer forum and I don't want to make it into one, but Rooney is probably the best athlete to come from your country in quite a while. He's also a big-game performer so he was an odd choice for the threadstarter to make his point with. I don't see what tyhe criticism is.
Anorak, a Henry Cooper who wasn't prone to cuts would be akin to Wladimir Klitschko with a chin. History would likely not be the same. Cooper had Ali in serious trouble in that first fight and if he didn't start to bleed, who knows if Ali would have survived the distance with him. Still, those are the breaks. Everyone has his weakness.
It has a lot to do with how they conduct themselves, Joe Calzaghe doesn't do himself any favours by appearing to come across as arrogant, in much the same way as Lennox Lewis did, only difference being that Lewis was a household name. The British and Americans are not actually that much different in so far as they generally don't like arrogant, cocky people.
It does seem that the British like humble ''losers'', but that doesn't nessacerilly mean they don't like humble winners either, it just so happens, that many ''winners'' are not particulary humble. I'm pretty sure a guy like Evander Holyfield would have been a very popular british boxer, if he was british, just like i think a guy like Lance Armstrong would have been hugely popular as a british sports icon.
I think it's just a coincidence that a lot of British sports icons were ''nearly men'', I think it has more do do with how they conduct themselves and how they come across. As far as i know, there is popular british sports icons who were at the very top anyway, guys like Seb Coe, and Steve Redgrave, were/are pretty popular, as far as i know.
The british always love a colorful characters, just like us. Cooper, Bruno, those guys were personalities, not just fighters. One of my favorite boxing quotes comes from Cooper, in response to a woman boxing abolitionist who brought up the condition of his flattened nose. His response was "My excuse is boxing, what's yours?"
Also Cooper the fighter was no slouch. The guy had some fine skills and one of the better left hooks of the time perod. He was a deadly, deadly puncher and though that hook wasn't quite on the Frazier level it was seriously not far off. Cooper was a legitimate top contender.
Calzaghe is just a damn good champion. I don't think he's a big personality. He's a handsome guy, but from what I've heard he just isn't that interesting aside from his profession. That's not a knock on him, the guy deserves our respect and will probably be happy at the end of his career when he goes out with the money and fame he's earned. He's probably the type to not care much for excessive attention.
I think it's got a bit to do with personality too. I mean, Audley's not exactly been taken to the nation's heart.
Rooney's class, BTW. He's still just a kid so cut him some slack.
bloody annoying though. brit father to son i love frank bruno he shit himself against mike tyson and was knocked out twice but i still love him :grumble: :grumble: