HERE are precious few happy endings in boxing, and sometimes the saddest stories are those of unfulfilled potential. But Gary Cornish, whose career was cut short a year ago at just 31, has come to terms with his fate.
Last summer, the Inverness heavyweight was deep into training for a formidable assignment against touted Croatian Filip Hrgovic when he got the phone call that all fighters dread. He had failed a brain scan, and the British Boxing Board of Control would not renew his licence.
“I was absolutely devastated,” says Cornish. “I’d been training three times a day. I was super fit; everyone was saying how shredded I looked. I was happy and everything was going right. I was going to win that [Hrgovic] fight. He’s a very good prospect but I wouldn’t have taken it if I didn’t believe I’d beat him.”