Alan Rudkin

The all-time doyen of British boxing writers, George Whiting, bestowed upon the waif from Merseyside the Dickensian description of an 'importunate urchin' when he made the first of his agonisingly close challenges for the world bantamweight title.

It was an appropriate label for a slip of a lad who grew up in Liverpool with the Beatles and who sported the flop-fronted hair-cut to match.

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His third world title bid took him to California. Yet again, he dared to travel abroad to take on a genuinely world-class champion. The great Ruben Olivares proved to be a challenge too far and Rudkin was floored three times before being stopped in the second round.

As it sank in that the supreme prize would now be beyond him, he was widely acknowledged as the finest British boxer never to win a world title.

It was a distinction he reinforced in his last two fights before eye injury forced his retirement at just 30, the victories over Agustin Senin and Johnny Clark by which he reclaimed his European, British and Commonwealth championships.

That reputation was carried with him as he made a post-ring living as a publican in Liverpool. Fight fans flocked to his bar from all over Britain and that popularity helped him cope with the sadness of divorce and the premature death of one of his two sons.

He was active, also, in support of boxing charities and travelled to London for a ring reunion at Shoreditch Town Hall just four days before he was found lying in a street near his home at 3am.

Boxing's urchin of the Beatles era is dead at only

Read all about it: Rudkin reads the Daily Mail as strongman and pub landlord Butty Sugrue lifts the boxer's chair in his teeth.