‘I was the weakest link’ — Joe Joyce and his mother discuss boxing life

Long before Joe Joyce was an Olympic medal-winner or a heavyweight title contender, his mother, Marvel Opara, would shuffle into the dusty halls of leisure centres and sit a few rows back from the ring. She came to recognise the grunt her son made when he threw a punch and the dull thud or piercing smack that revealed whether it had landed on leather or skin.

Accompanied by a friend or carer, whenever Opara heard them gasp, signalling that Joyce had been hurt, she drowned out their concerns by screaming encouragement at the dark outlines in front of her. “At first, it used to bother me,” she says. “The sounds are so brutal. It’s like I can feel them going through my body.”

Opara is