Ray Close, Belfast boxer who twice challenged Chris Eubank, dies aged 57

Ray Close, the Belfast boxer and former European super-middleweight champion who twice challenged Chris Eubank for a world title, has died aged 57, BBC Sport and RTÉ reported on 2 October 2026. His first fight with Eubank ended in a draw; their Belfast rematch ended in a split-decision defeat for Close. Tributes from boxing clubs have recalled both his achievements and his place in the local community.

The reports establish the news of Close’s death but do not give a date of death. Neither report cited here identifies a cause. Close’s career stretched from a Belfast youth club to a European title and two of the closest world-title contests of Eubank’s championship years.

How Ray Close rose from Ledley Hall to the European title

Close was born in 1969 and began boxing at Ledley Hall Youth and Boxing Club in east Belfast when he was 10, according to BBC Sport. After an amateur career, he turned professional in 1988. RTÉ reports that he won the Irish super-middleweight title in late 1989 and retained it over the following years.

His European breakthrough came in March 1993. RTÉ reports that Close stopped Vincenzo Nardiello in Lombardy, Italy, to win the European Boxing Union super-middleweight title. Within two months, he was challenging the unbeaten Eubank for the World Boxing Organization title in Glasgow.

The Glasgow draw with Chris Eubank in 1993

Eubank knocked Close down with an uppercut in the 11th round, but Close got up and survived to the final bell. Eubank praised Close’s work rate as ‘brilliant and consistent’, while saying he believed his clean punches and the knockdown had done enough to win. The judges scored the bout a draw.

Why the Belfast rematch ended in a split decision

The pair met again at Belfast’s King’s Hall on 21 May 1994. Eubank retained the WBO title by split decision. The Independent’s ringside report said Close outjabbed and outboxed Eubank through the first five rounds, before two right hands in the 10th hurt the challenger.

The three judges’ cards showed how differently they saw the contest: 118–112 and 115–114 for Eubank, and 117–114 for Close, according to The Independent. A second world-title opportunity had ended without a belt for Close, but the Glasgow draw and Belfast decision remained the fights most closely associated with his name in both BBC Sport’s and RTÉ’s accounts of his career.

The cancelled third fight and Close’s final bouts

A third meeting was planned for 1995, but it did not take place. BBC Sport reports that the British Boxing Board of Control revoked Close’s boxing licence after an MRI scan revealed two lesions on his brain. RTÉ also reports the licence revocation following a brain scan, and says Eubank instead fought Steve Collins in Millstreet, County Cork, where he lost his title.

Close later obtained a licence in the United States and won five fights in Illinois, according to BBC Sport. RTÉ places those bouts across 1996 and 1997. BBC Sport identifies his final fight as a knockout win over Larry Willis in June 1997 and gives his completed professional record as 25 wins, three defeats and one draw. That draw was against Eubank.

Tributes from the clubs that knew Ray Close

Ledley Hall, the east Belfast club where Close started boxing, called him a ‘true gentleman, humble, kind and always willing to give something back’, BBC Sport reported. The club said he had shown its young people what could be achieved by someone who had trained in the same place, and that his story had inspired generations there.

Bangor Abbey Boxing Academy, where Close had trained, described him as a ‘huge loss to the boxing fraternity of Ireland and across the world’, according to BBC Sport. The academy said Close and his family had been part of its club from the start.

In a report published on 24 September, the Newtownards Chronicle described Close as a resident of Phoenix Clinic in Newtownards and reported that his son Benjamin had donated an interactive activity board to the clinic. The Chronicle attributed Close’s traumatic brain injury to boxing. That report describes his later circumstances; it does not establish a cause of death or show that the injury was the same condition as the MRI findings reported during his boxing career.