Arriving in England last year to take his career to the next level, Rishi Gurung was immediately knocked down in the boxing ring by Alfie Winter’s top welterweight.
“Can you imagine? The first guy I had to deal with, he tried to kill me,” Gurung said. “He was trying to destroy my love.”
A Nepalese immigrant who moved to Hong Kong when he was 10, Gurung was initially drawn to boxing because “it’s lonely … and I enjoyed punching people, and punching them back”.
As the blows continued to rain down from Winter, partner of Conor Benn and Chris Eubank Jnr, Gurung drew on his earliest experience of the brutality of his chosen sport.
Already showing promise at the age of 13, but unable to get permission to fight under the age of 18, he beat the 23-year-old on an open card in Sham Shui Po.
“I broke my nose in the first round and was gasping for the rest of the fight,” Gurung said. “My towel was soaked in blood, when I came home with it and when my parents saw the boxing side, they didn’t want me to do it again, I stopped for a while.”
