China’s ‘Monster’ Xu Can aims to roar back against Brandon Benitez and begin journey back to WBA featherweight belt
- Chinese boxer sank into deep depression after he lost his world title last year
- Now he has another shot at glory and a chance to make history
Xu Can is no stranger to pressure – the Chinese boxer has been living with expectations of greatness his entire life.
Ever since his father, Xu Xiaolong, decided that Xu Can was destined to be a fighter, he has been living with those demands on his shoulders.
That might explain why the loss of his WBA featherweight world title to Leigh Wood last year sent the 28-year-old into a deep depression that took months to recover from.
Next month, Xu makes his comeback against Brandon Benitez in Tampa Bay, Florida, which will hopefully put him on the road to reclaiming his crown, which he won in 2019 via his unanimous decision win over Puerto Rico’s Jesus Rojas.
The journey back to the ring on October 7 did not begin when he was knocked out by Wood, nor in the months that followed. For Xu Can, his journey started in Fuzhou, a city in the northeastern part of Jiangxi province, about the same time Hong Kong was being handed back to China in 1997.
Xu Can would not have become a boxer it had not been for his father, whose unshakeable belief in his son’s talent had existed almost from the moment the younger Xu was born in 1994.
