‘I feel responsible’: Mike Towell’s opponent on death of Scottish boxer
Dale Evans, the last opponent for deceased Scottish boxer Mike Towell in a Thursday bout, has shared his thoughts on the fight’s consequences with media.
News about the local boxing match in Glasgow, Scotland, made the headlines last weekend, when it was revealed that the knocked out opponent had been pronounced dead following a one-day hospital stay.
The 25-year-old Towell left behind longtime girlfriend Chloe Ross and a two-year-old son.
“I feel like I am responsible, because we are the ones punching each other - and this is something I have to live with now,” Evans told BBC on Monday.
“I can't stop thinking about Mike and his poor family. All my thoughts are with them.
“I feel like one of my own family has passed away.”
Evans also shared his thought about quitting professional boxing after the accident.
“I have been low and thinking that I would probably stop boxing now, but I think I will have a break and I will try to win the British title in Mike’s memory.”
Following the fatality, British MP Paul Flynn spoke on “needed” rules changes in the contacts sports.
“We ought to change the rules in many sports and realize that the head is a very delicate part of the body and to protect it, and minimize the number of blows the brain suffers,” he told the Guardian.
Flynn attempted to ban blows to the head in boxing back in 1998 and again in 2005 through failed private member’s bills.
He also added that the boxing is the worst in the list of dangerous sports.
“The whole purpose of the sport is to render the opponent unconscious,” he said.
According to Towell’s girlfirend, writing in a Facebook post, “Michael had severe bleeding and swelling to his brain.”
Ross also said that Towell “had been complaining of headaches for the last few weeks, but we put it down to migraines with the stress of his fight.”
