Topic: Muhammad Ali

There has been a lot said about the late Muhammad Ali. Fans can recite the facts, quote many statistics and tell you lots of life history. However, East End resident Alan Ebanks has a personal connection to the boxing great, whose recent death had him musing on some very special aspects of Ali’s life.

As a young amateur boxer who had grown up training with a punching bag made from coconut sacks filled with sand and hung from a Logwood tree, Denward Ebanks remembers better than most the glamour of Muhammad Ali’s visit to the Cayman Islands.

Muhammad Ali was front page news in the Caymanian Compass for four days straight in 1984 when he visited Grand Cayman – twice.

When I saw on TV the news of the passing of Muhammad Ali, two overwhelming emotions engulfed me: sadness and relief.