Daily Mirror

WHYTE’S NO BUM, THANKS TO MUM

I couldn’t let her know the things I did... I couldn’t bear to see her disappoint­ed

- BY CHRIS McKENNA

MUM has always been the word for Dillian Whyte.

The Brixton-based heavyweigh­t faces former WBO champion Joseph Parker at the O2 in London tonight and mum Jane will be ringside.

This is the fighting she knows about – but there’s been plenty in her son’s past she’s unaware of.

The 30-year-old is on the brink of a world title shot and has sold out the 17,000-seater O2. But the man who was a father at 13, and who has been shot and stabbed, says he probably shouldn’t even be here.

“When I was growing up I never thought I would even be alive at this age,” he said.

“A lot of people I grew up with are dead, or doing long, long stretches in prison. When I remember some of the things I have done or been through I sometimes think ‘I was lucky there.’

“But when I got into the boxing I knew I would be a world champion, straight away I knew.”

Because of his dark days growing up, Whyte was cast as the bad boy of British boxing, especially when he went up against golden boy Anthony Joshua in 2015.

It is a tag that he wants to shake off but he really cares only what his nurse mum thinks of him.

“You can think what you like about me as long as my mother is happy with me,” Whyte said.

“My mum is happy with me, even without being a world champion. She’s happy with me that I’ve turned my life around. I’m alive and doing something positive.

“My mum didn’t know half the stuff I got up to because I always kept it away from her. I was scared of my mum but not out of fear, out of respect.

“Whatever I was doing, all the stuff I’ve been through, I didn’t go to hospital because I didn’t want my mum to find out because of the fear of disappoint­ing her. I was the bad boy but when it comes to my mum, she would be like ‘come inside’ and I’d be like ‘Alright yeah, OK Mum’.”

Whyte, whose only defeat came against Joshua, a seventh-round knockout at London’s 02 in December 2015, was born in Jamaica but his mum moved to Britain when he was just two to get a better job to help the family.

He didn’t join her until he was 12 as he stayed with his father in the Caribbean before moving to Brixton as a teenager.

“The lifestyle’s different,” he said. “I never had a fridge in Jamaica. I couldn’t go to the fridge and find something to eat.” He once said about his early days in Britain: “I swapped one ghetto for another. You needed to be strong. You had to be affiliated with something or someone.”

Whyte now stays close to his 12-strong family apart from when he is in training camp at Loughborou­gh University.

But while he is no longer in danger on the streets, there are still hazards at home because of a prankwar with his brother Sid.

The heavyweigh­t contender has been sporting a two-tone goatee this week but not by choice.

“I glued my brother’s hands together while he was sleeping,” added Whyte. “So he thought it would be funny to do my beard. He did it while I was asleep.

“I woke up and thought it was paint, I was there trying to wash it off but nothing was happening. He was just laughing.”

Whyte hopes a win tonight will earn a rematch with Joshua next year but there will also be a revenge mission on his brother once this fight is out of the way.

 ??  ?? BRAWL OR NOTHING Heavyweigh­ts Dillian Whyte and Joseph Parker square up at their weigh-in in London
BRAWL OR NOTHING Heavyweigh­ts Dillian Whyte and Joseph Parker square up at their weigh-in in London

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