The fighting has always come naturally to Scott Harrison, he says, it is the living that has proved more problematic. For a man who has spent the majority of his training camp for his next bout in a Spanish prison, Harrison, the WBO featherweight champion, looked remarkably well when he appeared at a press conference in London. He was tanned and he looked fit, but the spark in his eyes had dulled.
If Harrison needed a shock to get his life in order, prison might have been it. The Scot has come close to losing everything this year — money, his title, his career, his long-term relationship, his freedom. Nicky Cook, whom he faces in defence of his title at the ExCeL centre in London on December 9, could be the least of his problems, but for now it is the only one occupying his mind.
“I feel like my whole life’s on the line,” Harrison, 29, said. “It’s given me discipline, it’s opened my eyes to a lot of things and put things into focus. It’s made me more determined. It makes you think about what you could lose. It’s cost me a lot of money, that’s for sure.”
Harrison had to pass a battery of tests from the British Boxing Board of Control before the bout was put back on, including a meeting with a psychologist.
It was the thought of getting ready for a bout that kept Harrison’s spirits up during his 5½-week detention at the Alhaurín de la Torre prison in Málaga. He managed to train three times a day, although facilities were basic.
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The prison yard was for running and the football crossbar was used for chin-ups, while his fellow inmates improvised to make him a skipping rope and weights. “Break a broom handle into quarters, put tin cans on the end and fill them with concrete — you’ve got a weight,” Harrison said. “There were a lot of Brits inside the prison, but there were a lot of people from all over — it was like the United Nations.”
There was little chance of him putting on weight, either. “Food was a lot of fish and rice, which is part of what I eat when I’m training anyway,” he said. “I’m not worried about my preparations, I did a month before I went out to Spain.”
Barry Hughes, Harrison’s manager, was a regular visitor to Harrison inside and he had the difficult job of trying to raise the boxer’s spirits. “He was very down some of the time,” Hughes said. “It is difficult, he is sitting behind some glass and you are telling him he is going to get bail, but it never seemed to be happening.”
Harrison had gone to Spain to get away from the problems that had dogged him in and around Glasgow, where a string of arrests had led to him going into rehabilitation for alcoholism and depression. But, on October 6, he was arrested with his uncle and charged with attempted car theft and assault. In the hope that the problems would solve themselves, Harrison did not contact Hughes or Frank Warren, his promoter, and refused help from the British Consulate.
“I think he didn’t want to be seen that he had let me down,” Hughes said. “But he didn’t have a translator in court. He signed a piece of paper and thought he was going to be released, but was taken off to prison.”
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When his predicament was revealed, lawyers were confident of securing his immediate release from prison, but things dragged on. Finally, two days after Warren had called off the bout and hours before the WBO deadline to strip him of his title, Harrison was granted €28,000 (about £19,000) bail, put up by Hughes. His legal costs stand at about double that.
“There were one or two times when I was sitting in my cell that I thought it wasn’t going to happen,” Harrison said. “I was told I was going to get bail, but in Spain it always seemed to be ‘mañana, mañana‘.
“It’s made me more disciplined. I’m mentally right, I’m a fighter, it comes naturally to me — I’m going to smash Nicky Cook to bits. It was a bad situation and now it’s resolved. It’s brilliant to be out.”
While Harrison may have left the guards behind him in Spain, he is never far from his training team at the moment. “It’s good for him to have someone around for him to talk to all the time,” Hughes said. Developing a trusted support network around the boxer, he believes, is vital.
Hughes hopes that Harrison has turned a corner in his life. “I thought I saw clarity in him before, but now he seems different,” he said.
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Errant champion’s time on the ropes
September 2004 Grabs policeman by throat in struggle in a cab. Given an absolute discharge by Glasgow Sheriff Court, 18 months later
April 2005 Banned from pubs, clubs and hotels in East Kilbride town centre after series of aggressive incidents
April 2006 Arrested after incident in a Glasgow pub, charged with breach of the peace, refusing to leave a licensed premises, resisting arrest and police assault
May 14 Arrested outside nightclub near Loch Lomond May 16 Withdraws from title defence against Gairy St Clair
May 17 Checks into Priory Hospital Glasgow for alcohol and depression problems
September 6 Arrested again when appears in court and charged with a further seven offences
October 6 Arrested by Spanish police in Málaga November 8 Frank Warren cancels bout against Nicky Cook on December 9 after Harrison fails to secure his release from prison
November 11 Harrison is granted bail November 14 Arrives back in Glasgow
November 15 Undergoes a series of medical and psychological tests by doctors appointed by the British Boxing Board of Control (BBBC)
November 21 BBBC clears him to box Cook
November 22 WBO approves bout with Cook