Cancer survivor Dan will always be a winner... even if he loses

FOR most people, getting into a ring with Gennady Golovkin comes with a sense of trepidation.

Not for Daniel Jacobs. But then most active boxers do not have a ‘w’ in the victory column following a fight with cancer.

The New Yorker (top, left) was out for 19 months battling bone cancer after doctors discovered a tumour on his spine in 2011.

When they were blasting 25 doses of radiation through him the goal was not get him back in a ring just to get him on his feet.

First he started to walk, then to jog, then to hit the heavy bag. Remarkably three years after being diagnosed following a visit to Iraq to see American troops he was contesting the vacant WBA middleweight title.

Four defences later he is putting everything on the line, professionally at least, against the great GGG (below).

After being told he would never fight again the fact he is sharing a ring with Golovkin at Madison Square Garden next week is something to celebrate.

Before his illness he was progressing nicely but then he was taken out by Russian Dimitry Pirog with a shot that was so good we teach it now to our fighters.

You attack with the left, throw a double jab, put a straight right in, switch the feet to southpaw then come back to orthodox with a left hook.

Jacobs went over like a tree for his only pro defeat in 33 bouts. He was stopped in the amateurs by another Russian, who walked him onto a big right hand, which suggests he has a vulnerability about the whiskers.

If the shot is good enough, we all do. But he is very quick, punches hard and could cause Golovkin problems in the early rounds.

The fact that Kell Brook was in the fight with Golovkin early on points the way for Jacobs. Whether he can build on that is the big question against an all-time great.

As Brook discovered you cannot hide from Golovkin. He just hunts you down and takes you out. At 34 he seems to be getting even better. He could end up rewriting the record books.

Nobody wants to take him on. Saul Canelo has found every reason to look elsewhere so you have to admire Jacobs for stepping up.

You hear people say Golovkin would not have been a match for the likes of Carlos Monzon, Marvin Hagler, James Toney, all of whom would have eaten him alive.

Don’t make me laugh. Golovkin would have given them all they could handle, and more.

Jacobs is a handful, very exciting, but it ends like they all do.