James DeGale: 'Boxing is a lonely game but I've got a great family'

Olympic champion learns to deal with triumph and tragedy as he prepares for only his eighth professional fightJames DeGale rolls out of bed and pads across his bedroom to pull on a pair of shorts and a T-Shirt. He can hear his mother, Diane, yelling cheerfully to me above the sound of her doing the housework in her pyjamas. "I've managed to wake him," she hollers. On cue, the Olympic gold-medal winning boxer, who is preparing for his eighth professional fight, opens his door. He looks briefly like a giant baby, grinning goofily and blinking blearily, as he toddles my way."James, are you up?" his mum calls out again from the kitchen.The 24-year-old DeGale stretched out his hand, gurgles a warm hello and gives me a wink as if to say, "Mothers ? what can you do?" But he also looks relaxed and happy as, inside his parents' front room in Harlesden, London, he chats away as his dad, Leroy, brings him a steaming mug of tea. DeGale, by now, is jokingly flexing his muscles to show his readiness for his British super-middleweight title eliminator against Carl Dilks in Birmingham a week on Saturday.There is little sign of anxiety as he anticipates returning to the city where, 18 months ago, he made his winning pro debut but was barracked by a cruel if ignorant section of the crowd. Yet, before we relive that painful night or look forward to the likelihood of his eighth successive victory since winning gold in Beijing, DeGale winces at a far more jarring memory.A week today, on 14 September, it will be exactly a year since Darren Sutherland was found dead, hanged in his flat in south London. The 27-year-old Irish boxer's suicide marked a tragic end to a career that was rich in promise. Sutherland had won bronze in Beijing and all four of his professional fights. He had also edged his intense amateur rivalry with DeGale. When they met in the Olympic semi-final in 2008, Sutherland had won four out of their five previous fights. But DeGale boxed beautifully to outpoint Sutherland and set himself up for gold and a contract with Frank Warren in excess of a million pounds.Sutherland still had his bronze medal as he left Dublin for London, signed with Frank Maloney and called himself "The Dazzler". He started confidently as a professional and stopped all four of his opponents, with his final victory being just over two months before he killed himself.DeGale shakes his head in disbelief when hearing that next Tuesday marks the anniversary of his death. "No way," he exclaims. "Bloody hell, is it a year already? I was here, at home in my bedroom, when my mum told me. I remember I half welled up and said, 'No, it can't be true. It must be a sick joke.' But it was all true. I was saying, 'How? Why?' and I started researching what had happened to him. It makes you sad when you tap the words on to the screen: 'Boxer Hanged Himself.'"Me and Darren Sutherland went back a long way. He beat me four times. OK, I won the one that really mattered, but he was a very good fighter. We had this healthy rivalry. Before a fight we'd give each other the eye but, afterwards, we always talked. All the Irish boys used to tell me he was the kind of fighter that got up at four in the morning to eat his porridge and go for a run. Boxing was his life. If he didn't box well he'd get upset. He wanted to get to the top ? just like me."Sutherland appeared to be adjusting well to the professional ring until the last few weeks before his death. Then, his serious depression emerged and Maloney arranged for him to visit a psychologist. Sutherland hanged himself two hours before his first appointment and DeGale is still bewildered by the bleak outcome. But he pauses thoughtfully when asked if it made him consider again the psychological toll of boxing."It really did. Boxing is a lonely game. It makes you look at yourself and feel all your fears and doubts. You can seem very alone when you're waiting to go into that ring. But I've got a great family, and a fantastic promoter [Warren] and trainer [Jim McDonnell]. I've got this bond with all these people. I can always turn to them if things get hard."I heard Darren had a bit of OCD [obsessive compulsive disorder] but that ain't so strange. All boxers are OCD. You can see a bit of OCD in me before I go into the ring. I can't put on my right boot before my left. It's the same with my gloves. It's got to always be the left foot and the left hand first. I would freak out if I did it differently. I have to do the left first because that's the way I done it when I won the Olympics."DeGale will feature in one of the headline bouts in the biggest promotion in British boxing this year ? with Warren's "Magnificent Seven" bill being screened live on Sky Box Office on 18 September. This, however, will be the same Birmingham arena where, in February 2009, he was ridiculed during his debut. Vepkhia Tchilaia, a journeyman from Georgia, could barely lay a punch on the elusive DeGale who ducked in and out of range to land accurate combinations. But DeGale did not chase a bloody knockout and so drunken men who have probably never laced on a pair of gloves in their life, or ever stood alone in the ring, hurled abuse at him.Some former fighters and astute ringside observers were incensed by the lack of boxing knowledge and the sheer ugliness of the crowd. But DeGale sounds unnecessarily harsh on himself. "Looking back, I wasn't that good. I boxed within myself. I was still thinking like an amateur."Did the booing hurt him? "Of course," he admits. "It really hurt me. People think I'm tough and arrogant but I've got feelings. I heard those boos and I was thinking, 'Is that for me?' I know it was only a small minority but it's very hard to take. The whole night was weird. I was dead nervous because it was my first pro fight and I was basically topping the bill in front of 11,000 people. There was a lot of pressure because I'd been running my mouth, telling everyone that James 'Chunky' DeGale was taking the pros by storm. It's easy to do that at a press conference. You feel different 30 minutes before a fight. That's when you feel lonely."I saw Frankie Gavin [another gifted former amateur who made his pro debut that night] after his fight. Frankie was sweating and bleeding and he was saying, 'Chunk, Chunk, make sure you watch his head in there.' He had been cut by the other geezer's head and I was thinking, 'This is proper, mate, this is serious.' I think the atmosphere affected me."Afterwards I was really down but Jim [McDonnell] had confidence in me. He was saying, 'Don't worry, Chunk, that was good.' But he took me back to the gym and told me I've got to start punching harder and planting my feet. Something just clicked. I started feeling like a pro. I also went back and watched the tape of that first fight. I was cringing because I was just tip-tapping and moving away. I thought, 'I can't have this.' I'm a proud boy and so I was determined to change people's opinions."DeGale has won five of his six fights since then by TKO and he is now one of the most intriguing fighters in British boxing. There has also been real bite to his preparations against Dilks who has a decent 14-2 record. "I want to go back to the place where I got booed and put on a real performance to show them how far I've come. Dilks is talking a lot, telling everyone how he's going to bully me. I just hope he don't freeze on the night. Amateur boxing is like a game but you have to be spiteful as a pro. I've got that spiteful streak. I've always had it ? just ask my mum and dad."During his briefly wayward youth on the streets of Harlesden, DeGale's parents, especially his mother, had to deal with him firmly. They were willing to turf him out of the family home if he did not start showing respect and dedication. He was shocked into changing. Now, while he is rich enough to have bought himself a couple of swanky cars and his own apartment in Harlesden, DeGale admits he still can't live without his parents."When I got the apartment [300 metres down the road from his mum and dad] I tried to live on my own. But I couldn't do any cooking or washing for myself. I lasted a couple of weeks and then moved back home. My mum now looks after my business permanently and they keep me on the straight and narrow. When they're doing my head in I can escape to the apartment for a night ? but then I always come home."A contrasting image of Sutherland, alone and desolate in the last hours before his death, makes us both shiver. "It's a tough business, boxing, but I've got my family and a great team. I'm maturing all the time but I'm still a baby. I'm only 24 and when I get to my proper level in boxing, world-class level, you'll start seeing the best of me. But one thing won't change. I'll always know that, with my family behind me, I'm a very lucky boy."James DeGaleBoxingDonald McRaeguardian.co.uk © Guardian News & Media Limited 2010 | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds

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