Why are there so few great boxers from Western Europe? (besides UK)

[O Prophet]

There are countless great champions from Eastern Europe (Russia/Soviet), UK, North/South America, and increasingly from Asia.

Yet I noticed that the entire region of Western Europe (France, Germany, Italy, Sweden, Spain, Portugal, Greece, Finland, Denmark, Netherlands, Bulgaria, Hungary, etc) seem to produce very few pro boxing champions at the world level.

I mean occasionally Western Europe will produce a world class fighter but why are they so few and far between when compared to Eastern Europe, The Americas, and the UK?

[LetOutTheCage]

Interest in the sport in those countries I guess, The Spanish generally speaking are a sport loving nation but for some reason boxing is not very popular there.

France and Holland in particular take a keen interest in kick boxing so a lot of athletes prefer to go into K1 or one of the other kick boxing organisations instead of boxing.

As for the Germans, they do seem to love boxing but their fighters dont seem to travel...

Have no clue about place like Finland, Denmark etc I guess it's just down to it not being a popular sport in those regions.

[Citizen Koba]

There are countless great champions from Eastern Europe (Russia/Soviet), UK, North/South America, and increasingly from Asia.

Yet I noticed that the entire region of Western Europe (France, Germany, Italy, Sweden, Spain, Portugal, Finland, Denmark, Bulgaria, Hungary, etc) seem to produce very few pro boxing champions at the world level.

I mean occasionally Western Europe will produce a world class fighter but why are they so few and far between when compared to Eastern Europe, The Americas, and the UK?

Ha ha.. well if you work on the principle that socio-economic reasons are what mainly drive people to try to earn a living smacking **** outta each other it might be that there's just easier ways of making an OK living in most Western European countries.

If you look at income inequalities (the gini coefficient is one method) you'll find that Mexico and the US (the two biggest boxing nations) rank significantly higher than most of Western Europe. The UK is a weird outlier though... income inequality ain't too extreme but we got more boxers per capita than pretty much anywhere outside Mexico and places like Nicaragua.

Not surprised the rest of Europe tends to think of us as an island of thugs.

[Toffee]

I don't think those countries are the exception. I think the UK, Eastern European nations, Cuba, Mexico, Puerto Rico, the US are the exceptions.

Most countries just aren't that into it.

India should be producing champions on population. They aren't. Nor Indonesia.

[Toffee]

Or maybe I'm wrong and India are about to start making a charge...

https://www.greatestsportingnation.c...boxing-amateur

[mlac]

Interest in the sport in those countries I guess, The Spanish generally speaking are a sport loving nation but for some reason boxing is not very popular there.

France and Holland in particular take a keen interest in kick boxing so a lot of athletes prefer to go into K1 or one of the other kick boxing organisations instead of boxing.

As for the Germans, they do seem to love boxing but their fighters dont seem to travel...

Have no clue about place like Finland, Denmark etc I guess it's just down to it not being a popular sport in those regions.

lejarraga has been selling out Bilbao for years now, with some of the best atmosphere in world boxing..

[Luilun]

They’re into Soccer and Bull fighting

[Marchegiano]

Well, because the English are cheaters!!


Okay, so let's do some really short-hand history:

Sparta invents boxing to improve their soldiers' performances on the battlefield

Greece as a whole adopts boxing as a sport. They bring in what is modern Turkey, the first champion is an Anatolian.

Greece, Turkey, and Italy are your major players for thousands of years.

Rome

Sport boxing is made illegal. Boxing become an honor duel function.

Then Rome falls and everyone needs to mimic Rome.

Greece and Turkey, dunno, don't hear much about them after this, but, Russia, Germany, Iberia and France sure do take up some Romanisms for themselves and also they have their out versions of boxing inspired by Rome.

Sometimes on the surface it seems really disconnected, for example, Roman boxing is a 1 vs 1 affair, where as Russians boxed by whole towns vs whole towns. Seems really really different, except, the purpose of Greek and Roman boxing was to limit in-fighting amongst the city-states and the purpose of Russian wall boxing was also to limit inter-russo wars.

Boxing looks different just like how the buildings look different and the language sounds different but the effect is still there and the inspiration is Roman. French boxing was very different from German which was different from Spanish, so on.

I should point out the closest thing to an international match so far is back in the ancients when Greece or Rome were hosting their farthest territories, but even then it was all in the empires.


Back to it; England is clearly a late comer to this game but England has something the others don't, archaeology. In England, when boxing was just starting, it wasn't just cool to mimic Rome, but rather, what was super cool, was digging up ancient Greek and Roman **** and claiming some kind honorable past connected to it and the Home State.

Where German boxing is basically based off the stories told, word-of-mouth, about Theaganese, English boxing would be actually based on the found understanding of Greek boxing by digging it up.

Seems small given we're all just face punching right?

Well, yeah, kinda, except when you have handed down history rather than records there's a just a ****load of warping that happens.

One would assume in the beginning of the 18th century Italy would be the authority for all things Roman. Despite the Holy Roman, despite the Czar, despite the King of Spain being handed the Byzantine crown, and Napoleon later or the rise of the BE later, it's just easy to assume Roman history was best kept by the Italians. Maybe, technically, in Italy the history is preserved but Italy (and Greece) did a really bad job at, you know, paying attention to the tablets they were walking on.

It was England that brought boxing back to it's true form and England should get mad props for it because everyone wanted to be the new Rome since the old Rome, especially the french and germans with their Holy Empire, the Russians and their Czar, and the Spanish with their legal claim to the eastern and religious connection to the old western empire, and even Italy with their arrogant belief that they know because their folks was there, but, none of these jokers bothered to crack a book can you dig it?

England comes in like a storm, makes boxing a sport again, not an honor duel, not a political function, but a sport that features a duel serving a political function.

England throws down the gauntlet and says let any mug what reckons they can box step to the Jolly Ol' and get smacked down quick-fast.

Italy steps!

The English champ wants none of the Venetian challenger, instead, the English champ elects a new English champ to take on the man from Veneto.

The two square off at James Figg's place, Figg is the ref, the English Champ is his student, the Venetian does come with a posse of backers and fans though.

Two things happen in this fight, flopping, and body shots.

Flopping was done across the board, from Iberia to Russia folks flopped. Basically it means going down with the punch, like an extreme form of rolling, even though it did not hurt or sometimes even connect. Technically it's not against the rules because there are none but from Iberia to Russia no one saw it as honorable or acceptable

The Englishman flopped as the Venetian threw exclusively for the Anglo's head. Tired and frustrated the Venetian protested but Figg had none of it.

The Venetian timed his foe, hit him hard, and sent the man out of the ring. To him he'd won. Figg had none of that either and reset the match. There was no time frame for getting up. They've fight until one quit or could not.

This time it was time for the English to work some timing. He did that, timed his foe and planted a body blow direct to the gut. Veneto doubled over in pain and promptly quit the match saying

" No foreign man shall ever experience this fair play the English speak of "


My point is, it's easy to win your sport. The Italian felt he won, the English felt he won, it's only because England became hegemony that we say Whittaker won that fight. The Italians, their press, their champion, all feel like their man won twice actually. First the Anglo DQ'd himself by flopping to every strike. Then the Anglo was KO'd right out of the ring. Italian boxing stayed in Italy where as English boxing took over through the BE....so who wrote today's narrative?

Spain, Russia, France, Germany, Italy, Greece, and Turkey are playing English boxing....well....today we're all playing American boxing but you get my point. Most of their forms of boxing became some other sport we hardly pay any attention to on the international stage to this day. Also....is it any shocker really that modern MMA features team fighting in eastern europe? Dig it, it's culture man.

In another thread population is used to explain American dominance. Personally, I like history. America dominates because it doesn't make sense for any other nation to dominate. England handed America the crown in the 19th century because the English champs got dirty as **** and not even the English backers nor the fans could stand the bull anymore.

America became where fair fights are held so says then hegemony England. America becomes hegemony and Americans dominates because America dictates what is fair.

Europe makes a sanctioning body about a decade prior to the US because there was a call for it. Even by the early 20th Europe did not have clear and consistent rules for all euro states. Something America didn't even need until the Euros did it.


People call it corruption, and as I pointed out, always have, but it really isn't corruption so much as perspective. For example, today, everyone knows a limey ref calls a KO before a yank ref. That's not corruption, that's culture. English boxing was meant to have some kind of honor to it. In America it was always meant to be as brutal a display as we can get away with. Fast forward to now, makes sense for the honorable English to worry about safety more and the brutish Americans to give no ****s because we want a HL real KO.

Why doesn't western Europe have more great champions? Same reason why China has none.

Demokrates, in the first century, like 25 AD, yeah JC is like 25, is famous from Africa to China. He influenced kung fu. By their standards, in their culture, they do box well, much better than us actually, but, in our ranks you don't see no Chinamen champions.


I was SUPER glossy with this. There's a ton more I can mention, but, point is made. I do not think you need to look any farther than western hegemony to find why folks box best from different places.

It should be noted, boxing in the Holy Empire was highly ****in' illegal, get yer head removed level illegal. It makes sense for them to have interest, but also, lack the fostering culture that allows for greatness. Today, Germany has interest but lacks the culture. France has interest but lacks the culture...makes sense to me.

[djif]

Cause mainly there is no fighters among them (outside UK)..

[Scipio2009]

There are countless great champions from Eastern Europe (Russia/Soviet), UK, North/South America, and increasingly from Asia.

Yet I noticed that the entire region of Western Europe (France, Germany, Italy, Sweden, Spain, Portugal, Greece, Finland, Denmark, Netherlands, Bulgaria, Hungary, etc) seem to produce very few pro boxing champions at the world level.

I mean occasionally Western Europe will produce a world class fighter but why are they so few and far between when compared to Eastern Europe, The Americas, and the UK?

Because the commitment to amateur boxing doesn't really exist in the rest of Western Europe.

Just like sports everywhere, if the money is committed to athletics, the athletes will show up (and basically self-migrate to the sport that does the best with their particular physical skills).

Look at what's been happening with basketball; the exposure came, the sport was put into the schools, and as the athletes physically tuned to be basketball players started to cluster, you eventually found top athletes who were good enough to play in the NBA, and possibly a MVP at some point.