How I Put the Black in the Union Jack - Boxer Errol Christie's autobiography out now Hot

Errol Chrstie was European Amateur Champion, Captain of the England Boxing Team and Fight Night poster boy. But in 1985, after a string of professional knockouts, he was defeated by Mark Kaylor in a bout so controversial it threatened to spark an explosion of racial hatred and violence.

No Place To Hide: How I Put the Black in the Union Jack is his hard-hitting, and intensely personal memoir.

Christie was one of the most promising British boxers of his generation, a cocky, Ali-esque dancer with a reputation for devastating early knockouts. But this is not the story of a celebrity sportsman full of glamour and easy wins. This is a story about fighting.

Coventry in the dying days of the Seventies was a tough place to grow up – especially if you were poor and black. At the same time as the young Errol Christie was raising the flag in the ring, his fists were seeing off skinhead tormentors and NF bootboys on the streets. Britain was sickening from a vicious racial divide, and even when the big time turned up Errol soon discovered that a black boxer who refused to play by the rules – white rules – would never be tolerated.

In 1985, after a string of professional knockouts, Errol faced Mark Kaylor in a brutal bout that tore open the country’s simmering racial enmities. In the eighth round he went down – and stayed down, the roar of the hard right in his ears. But the years that followed would see Errol square up against a far tougher adversary – as he found himself out in the cold, struggling to get by, and alone with only his own shattered confidence and no place to hide.

These days, Errol Christie is a trainer and is one of the country’s leading coaches of ‘white collar boxing’ with students including Dermot O’Leary and Gianluca Vialli. He also works in inner city schools, using boxing and his experiences of racism to campaign against knife and gun crime.


Aurum Press and Waterstones.com are offering readers of Blacknet the chance to buy the book at a brilliant discount of £10 (RRP £16). Visit http://tinyurl.com/yezyhf9 or http://www.waterstones.com/waterstonesweb/products/errol+christie/tony+mcmahon/no+place+to+hide/7005986/ and enter code BC1966 at checkout.