AND STILL: Katie Taylor celebrates after being declared victorious in her undisputed super lightweight championship fight with Flora Pili. Pic: Stephen McCarthy/Sportsfile
Not all dreams can come true, even on Katie Taylor’s night of nights.
Thomas Carty wasn’t midway through the first round of his heavyweight bout with Doncaster’s Dave Allen when he took a punch near the back of the head and stumbled forward through the ropes and out of the ring.
Carty’s next act was to suck in air through an oxygen mask while the stadium sat stunned and officials scratched their heads. A no-contest it was. Carty eventually walked awayrubbing his temple and ruing his rotten luck.
A son of Phibsborough, he had spoken pre-fight about growing up within earshot of the stadium and rocking up there to watch the Dubs play football. “Let’s fucking go,” he roared as he walked towards the ring and the opportunity of a lifetime.
Just a few hours earlier and Emmet Brennan, another Dub whose childhood was silhouetted by Croker, was making his exit from the arena in a wheelchair after being sent to the canvas five times by the classy Taylor Bevan.
The Brennan-Bevan contest had been highlighted as a potential fight of the night. Brennan had a perfect 6-0 record. Lying flat on his back in the fourth as a white towel flew by his head was not how he saw this grandest of evenings going.
This is a sport that oozes decades and decades of the most uplifting stories but for every ‘Cinderella Man’ there are hundreds of Thomas Cartys slipping through the ropes and Emmet Brennans prostrate and trying to focus on the sky above.
Taylor has been coronated many times, at European Olympic and World levels, as a pro and as an amateur. this was to be cap on all that and over 80,000 people swarmed on Croke Park to see the queen on her throne before she stood down.
“Defeat would be horrible tonight, we have to win,” Eddie Hearn told RTÉ. Taylor’s trainer Ross Enamait had said as much at Tuesday’s press conference and the star herself had made it the core of her week’s work even while embracing the love.
If Carty’s downfall had pulled the lever on party mode then it was only a pause. The crowd had amassed throughout the day, from before 4pm, through eight undercard fights, energising pop and rock tunes and a litany of good luck messages from everyone and anyone.
Jamie Dornan. Tommy Tiernan. Michael Flatley. Andrew Scott. Fintan McCarthy. Kenneth Egan. Ronan Keating. Brian O’Driscoll. Barry McGuigan. Kate O’Connor. Tyson Fury. Katie McCabe. Rory McIlroy. Padraig Harrington. Troy Parrott. Bosco.
We may have made up one of those, but you get the gist.
This was always more than just a sporting event. This was so much more than that, maybe even more than Katie. The crowd sang along to Bon Jovi and Oasis and then to the actual, real-life Westlife like it was the biggest karaoke in the world.
The Barry Keoghan video, a ringside rendition of ‘Grace’ and the strains of Amhrann na bhFiann accompanied by a shot of Taylor standing in the tunnel stirred the last of any blood that might have been left unmoved. If this place had a roof it might have spun off.
