Former world champion Junior Witter is hoping that his good friend and Ingle gym stablemate, Kell Brook (36-2, 25 KOs), considering the idea of walking away from the sport.

Last Saturday night at Bramall Lane in Sheffield, Brook was stopped in eleven rounds by Errol Spence, who in victory captured the IBF welterweight title.

During the fight, Brook fractured his left orbital bone. The injury will require surgery and likely keep him on the shelf for the remainder of the year.

Last September, when Brook moved up to middleweight to challenge IBF, IBO, WBA, WBC champion Gennady Golovkin, he was stopped in five rounds and fractured his right orbital bone. That injury required surgery and kept Brook out of the ring for months.

Witter says enough is enough - although Brook and his promoter Eddie Hearn have pretty much confirmed that a ring return is on the cards, in the junior middleweight division.

And Witter does not expect Brook to retire. He anticipates the former champ will return at 154 or 160 in his next fight. 

“When you think of the serious injuries he’s had in his life, he’s fortunate they weren’t worse than they were” said Witter to the Sheffield Star.

“The stabbing (Brook was attacked in Tenerife in 2014) could have been the end for him. A chipped piece of bone (from either of the two eye socket injuries) could have blinded him. I don’t know anybody in boxing who has had both eye sockets broken. What’s worrying is that Golovkin is a hard puncher and maybe its not perhaps that surprising what damage he did.

“But Spence is not a single, heavy puncher, he doesn’t do it with one punch, it’s more pressure, yet he broke Kell’s socket. Does this suggests there is some kind of (bone) weakness? I say he’s been lucky that he hasn’t had worse injuries and I think he should retire because that luck has got to run out. I’m pretty sure his parents and his partner and others in his family are going to say: ‘Right you have had a great career, you’ve been world champion, you’ve done it.’ He’s earned a ridiculous amount of money and is set for life.

“There are loads of things he could do. But he’s stubborn and I don’t think he will retire! I can see him coming back at light middleweight or middleweight. Once he’s dealt with the damage there then he’ll have that decision to make - whether he is willing to risk all again. He’s going to have to wait until the eye is healed and see whether he thinks its worth continuing. But the longer he leaves it the harder it will be. After the operation, he is going to be sat on his hands for months."