Nathan Farrell is preparing for his

pro debut seven years after

witnessing Kieran collapse in

the ring. Elliot Worsell talks

to the Farrell brothers

AFTER it had all gone wrong, Nathan Farrell spent

the best part of 18 months asking his brother

if he was all right. Twenty times a day, by his

reckoning, and if the answer was yes, he would

ask again because he suspected his brother

was fibbing or playing down the concern. He

would ask if he was sure.

Given their closeness, asking his brother if

he was all right was as good as asking himself

the same question. “We are identical in how

we think and feel,” Nathan told Boxing News.

“We didn’t grow up as two people, we grew

up as one person. We were inseparable.

We lived the same life.”

The first time Nathan asked Kieran if

he was all right and really meant it was

on the night of December 7, 2012. They

were at Bowlers Exhibition Centre, both

inside a boxing ring, and Nathan’s hands

were on the shoulders of Kieran, who had

just completed a 10-round fight against

Anthony Crolla.

Before three scorecards confirmed

his brother’s defeat, Nathan asked the

question. He asked it not because he

feared Kieran would be despondent

about losing the first fight of his

professional career but because he knew

his brother’s mannerisms better than

most and that night correlated them with

those of boxers in trouble.

His instinct was correct. Far from all

right, Kieran, when asked how he was

doing, told Nathan he felt dizzy, which

was as close as he would ever come to

conceding he wasn’t all right, and then

collapsed, falling into the arms of his brother

but feeling no heavier than he did when they

used to wrestle and playfight in the living

room of their Bury home as children.

“That’s the picture I saw for basically 18

months every time I went to bed at night,”

Nathan recalled, not so much fighting back tears

as powering through them. “That’s all I saw, a

picture of my brother clinging on to me in the

boxing ring.

“Living with all this, I don’t think it will ever go

away but I just needed a chance to put things right,

not only for me but my family.”

There are three years separating Kieran and Nathan

Farrell and three distinct ways of telling them apart.

The first: Kieran, the older of the two, was an aggressive

orthodox lightweight known as “Vicious” who felt no way

about receiving a punch to give one, whereas Nathan, a

southpaw welterweight, is more inclined to hit and not get

hit. The second: Kieran has loved boxing since the age of

seven, whereas Nathan’s relationship with the sport started later

and is one of the love-hate-love variety. The third: Nathan is 26

and about to embark on his professional career, whereas Kieran,

29, was forced to retire from his seven years ago following a bleed on

the brain.➤

V

I

C

I

O

U

S

C

I

R

C

L

E

http://www.boxingnewsonline.net JULY 4, 2019 lBOXING NEWSl 23

FARRELL

★BROTHERS★

SPECIAL FEATURE