Property king Arthur plotting to lord it in ring
Posted: 08 Jan 2005, 10:33
BRIAN DONALD
TO VISIT boxing star Alex Arthur and his partner Debbie with their family of two infant boys at home you must first negotiate a security entry gate system that wouldn’t be out of place in a Hollywood star’s mansion.
Fortunately, it didn’t prove as tricky to unlock Edinburgh’s super featherweight champion and those dearest to him for a chat on life, the university and everything beyond the ring.
The couple have several targets in mind, all part of a strategy to make sure he won’t end up, like other Scots boxers, "broke in middle age with nothing to show for their pain and efforts but memories".
Debbie, 26, is convinced, for instance, that when Alex throws in the towel on his boxing career - "in six years time", she claims - they will also have garnered a lifestyle to match that of any famed resident of Beverly Hills. The mother of Alex’s two sons, Alex Junior, three, and Liston, six months, believes he can find a new role as an actor.
Such a transformation would see him follow in the footsteps of the 1930s American world-rated welterweight ‘Canada’ Lee who won an Oscar nomination for playing Sidney Poitier’s father in the movie Cry, The Beloved Country.
"I believe Alex has the talent and communication skills to be a good actor after his ring career but first things first," says Debbie. "We have to make sure we secure our future materially.
"Before taking time out to have our two sons, I worked for Edinburgh investment house Ivory & Sime [now Isis]. I saw fortunes being made and unmade in a single day, so that taught me that nothing, including wealth, is for ever. And how quickly you can lose everything unless you are careful.
"So in this life - especially in a boxing life - based on ups and downs you have to be eternally vigilant and smart to keep what you earn.
"That was one of the good things about me coming from a housing scheme in Niddrie and Alex coming from Drummond Street - we are both street smart.
"We are not stupid people, especially when it comes to detecting the kind of business phoneys who - too often in the past - have come between top Scottish boxers and their hard earned ring cash."
Waving her hand around the exclusive and tastefully furnished mews house in upmarket Newington that Alex, also 26, and Debbie recently bought, Debbie continues: "All this could disappear like snow off a dyke tomorrow if Alex’s boxing career nosedived with a couple of defeats.
"That was the biggest lesson I learned from Alex’s British super featherweight title defeat by Michael Gomez. How drastically his income dropped for his next fight [a successful IBF Inter-Continental title fight at Meadowbank against African Michael Kizzer].
"It made us both realise how important it was to invest every spare penny because the glory days won’t last for ever."
Alex agrees entirely with Debbie’s outlook and has put his winnings to good use.
"We already have a property portfolio of houses in Edinburgh which we rent out for income and that’s why I want to regain my British title by beating Craig Docherty in March in Glasgow, then meeting and beating Michael Gomez, then winning a world title - all in 2005.
"And we aim to use the money from those fights in 2005 to expand our property portfolio which is why Alex is so ruthlessly focused in training and in the ring," explains Debbie.
Alex nods in agreement. "Don’t get me wrong, I love all the glory and adulation and public recognition that winning in the ring gives me but ultimately boxing is a means to an end for Debbie and I.
"For I am just as determined as Debbie is that I will break the mould of Scottish champion boxers - the majority of whom have ended up broke in middle age with nothing to show for their pain and efforts but memories.
"I aim to fight for a maximum of six years yet - winning in the ring and with Debbie steadily building up our property portfolio with the purse monies.
"The income from this will then subsidise my ambitions of going to university to study a degree in Sports Nutrition - an area where already I have acquired sufficient knowledge to have advised WBO super middleweight champion Joe Calzaghe, who suffers from weight problems, after Joe sought out my advice.
"In addition, the money from winning and defending my British and European titles will be used to fund the education of my two sons and also underwrite my acting and media career which I fully intend to pursue after I hang up the gloves.
"I really believe that I can make it too both as an actor and a media boxing pundit like my ring coach Jim McDonnell who does inter-round summarising on TV boxing programmes.
"But hey! First I have to overcome two major obstacles in 2005 called Docherty and Gomez.
"With regard to Craig Docherty who I will fight on March 11 in Glasgow’s Kelvin Hall - he is the least of my worries.
"Look at the facts. Docherty only beat Russian Nikolai Eremeev by a single point. I blew Eremeev away in five rounds [in Glasgow in June 2002]. Which proves that I have the punch power that Docherty lacks.
"I also think it’s crazy having the British title bout with Docherty in the Kelvin Hall before 2000 people when 10,000 easily would have come out to Ingliston to see our east v west battle."
However, Arthur admits one name - Michael Gomez - still haunts him.
"I live, breathe and sleep Gomez. I want him back in the ring in 2005 even though he is giving a WBU title shot to Willie Limond who I beat in 2003, ahead of me.
"My big worry here is that Limond has the style to upset Gomez, Willie is a smart counter puncher which Gomez hates and I honestly think that Limond could beat Gomez when they clash early in 2005.
"However that could work to my advantage as, once I beat Docherty for the British title, a Gomez without a title of his own would have to stop talking those daft money figures like £150,000 he is asking to give me a rematch. Gomez also hates me and the thought of gaining a British title he won at my expense would be too big a temptation for Michael, so Willie Limond do me a favour and beat Gomez please."
Alex exudes a quiet confidence - and well he might after his last two bouts - but he’s well aware how finely balanced the master plan that Debbie and he have devised is.
"My honest belief that I can make it as an actor and media pundit after I hang up the gloves, relies on one thing - me staying on top in boxing for the next five or six years," he says.
TO VISIT boxing star Alex Arthur and his partner Debbie with their family of two infant boys at home you must first negotiate a security entry gate system that wouldn’t be out of place in a Hollywood star’s mansion.
Fortunately, it didn’t prove as tricky to unlock Edinburgh’s super featherweight champion and those dearest to him for a chat on life, the university and everything beyond the ring.
The couple have several targets in mind, all part of a strategy to make sure he won’t end up, like other Scots boxers, "broke in middle age with nothing to show for their pain and efforts but memories".
Debbie, 26, is convinced, for instance, that when Alex throws in the towel on his boxing career - "in six years time", she claims - they will also have garnered a lifestyle to match that of any famed resident of Beverly Hills. The mother of Alex’s two sons, Alex Junior, three, and Liston, six months, believes he can find a new role as an actor.
Such a transformation would see him follow in the footsteps of the 1930s American world-rated welterweight ‘Canada’ Lee who won an Oscar nomination for playing Sidney Poitier’s father in the movie Cry, The Beloved Country.
"I believe Alex has the talent and communication skills to be a good actor after his ring career but first things first," says Debbie. "We have to make sure we secure our future materially.
"Before taking time out to have our two sons, I worked for Edinburgh investment house Ivory & Sime [now Isis]. I saw fortunes being made and unmade in a single day, so that taught me that nothing, including wealth, is for ever. And how quickly you can lose everything unless you are careful.
"So in this life - especially in a boxing life - based on ups and downs you have to be eternally vigilant and smart to keep what you earn.
"That was one of the good things about me coming from a housing scheme in Niddrie and Alex coming from Drummond Street - we are both street smart.
"We are not stupid people, especially when it comes to detecting the kind of business phoneys who - too often in the past - have come between top Scottish boxers and their hard earned ring cash."
Waving her hand around the exclusive and tastefully furnished mews house in upmarket Newington that Alex, also 26, and Debbie recently bought, Debbie continues: "All this could disappear like snow off a dyke tomorrow if Alex’s boxing career nosedived with a couple of defeats.
"That was the biggest lesson I learned from Alex’s British super featherweight title defeat by Michael Gomez. How drastically his income dropped for his next fight [a successful IBF Inter-Continental title fight at Meadowbank against African Michael Kizzer].
"It made us both realise how important it was to invest every spare penny because the glory days won’t last for ever."
Alex agrees entirely with Debbie’s outlook and has put his winnings to good use.
"We already have a property portfolio of houses in Edinburgh which we rent out for income and that’s why I want to regain my British title by beating Craig Docherty in March in Glasgow, then meeting and beating Michael Gomez, then winning a world title - all in 2005.
"And we aim to use the money from those fights in 2005 to expand our property portfolio which is why Alex is so ruthlessly focused in training and in the ring," explains Debbie.
Alex nods in agreement. "Don’t get me wrong, I love all the glory and adulation and public recognition that winning in the ring gives me but ultimately boxing is a means to an end for Debbie and I.
"For I am just as determined as Debbie is that I will break the mould of Scottish champion boxers - the majority of whom have ended up broke in middle age with nothing to show for their pain and efforts but memories.
"I aim to fight for a maximum of six years yet - winning in the ring and with Debbie steadily building up our property portfolio with the purse monies.
"The income from this will then subsidise my ambitions of going to university to study a degree in Sports Nutrition - an area where already I have acquired sufficient knowledge to have advised WBO super middleweight champion Joe Calzaghe, who suffers from weight problems, after Joe sought out my advice.
"In addition, the money from winning and defending my British and European titles will be used to fund the education of my two sons and also underwrite my acting and media career which I fully intend to pursue after I hang up the gloves.
"I really believe that I can make it too both as an actor and a media boxing pundit like my ring coach Jim McDonnell who does inter-round summarising on TV boxing programmes.
"But hey! First I have to overcome two major obstacles in 2005 called Docherty and Gomez.
"With regard to Craig Docherty who I will fight on March 11 in Glasgow’s Kelvin Hall - he is the least of my worries.
"Look at the facts. Docherty only beat Russian Nikolai Eremeev by a single point. I blew Eremeev away in five rounds [in Glasgow in June 2002]. Which proves that I have the punch power that Docherty lacks.
"I also think it’s crazy having the British title bout with Docherty in the Kelvin Hall before 2000 people when 10,000 easily would have come out to Ingliston to see our east v west battle."
However, Arthur admits one name - Michael Gomez - still haunts him.
"I live, breathe and sleep Gomez. I want him back in the ring in 2005 even though he is giving a WBU title shot to Willie Limond who I beat in 2003, ahead of me.
"My big worry here is that Limond has the style to upset Gomez, Willie is a smart counter puncher which Gomez hates and I honestly think that Limond could beat Gomez when they clash early in 2005.
"However that could work to my advantage as, once I beat Docherty for the British title, a Gomez without a title of his own would have to stop talking those daft money figures like £150,000 he is asking to give me a rematch. Gomez also hates me and the thought of gaining a British title he won at my expense would be too big a temptation for Michael, so Willie Limond do me a favour and beat Gomez please."
Alex exudes a quiet confidence - and well he might after his last two bouts - but he’s well aware how finely balanced the master plan that Debbie and he have devised is.
"My honest belief that I can make it as an actor and media pundit after I hang up the gloves, relies on one thing - me staying on top in boxing for the next five or six years," he says.
) and the whole episode isn't even exciting. So what if they don't like each other, i don't like either of them, can i fight the winner?! :P