Katie Taylor reflects on her legacy ahead of a fairytale farewell at Croke Park
Translated from English and summarized by DistantNews. Read the original for the full story.
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- Katie Taylor will headline a boxing event at Dublin’s Croke Park four days after a press conference promoting her farewell fight.
- All 80,000 tickets sold rapidly, with half taken during the presale and the remainder gone within 17 minutes on July 28.
- Promoter Eddie Hearn said doubts surrounding the event had affected his confidence and left him wishing the fight had been arranged earlier.
Katie Taylor’s farewell fight at Croke Park has turned into the event her promoter once feared might not work. Four days before the bout, the mood around Taylor’s team was described as “misty-eyed euphoria.”
The latest press conference launched fight-week promotions and largely repeated the announcement event held in June. This time, it took place at the Helix Theatre at Dublin City University, where students moved around campus seemingly unaware that Taylor was nearby.
Wow, blimey! This is small!
Inside, the setting mixed regular GAA reporters with Matchroom and DAZN staff. The atmosphere was marked by the tin-whistle instrumental played at Croke Park before matches. The major change from June was the disappearance of questions about whether the event would sell.
Those concerns proved unfounded. Half of the 80,000 tickets went during the presale, while the rest sold out within 17 minutes after going on sale on July 28. Taylor will become the first boxer to headline a fight at Croke Park since Muhammad Ali in 1972.
People can sort of deflate your spirit, which is quite unusual for me. They did deflate my spirit a bit over the years. They made me question whether we could do it or whether it would actually work.
That comparison also recalls the much smaller crowd for Ali’s fight against Al “Blue” Lewis, which drew about 18,000 people. The promoter was later criticized by the GAA director general for setting ticket prices too high.
Eddie Hearn acknowledged that he regretted not arranging Taylor’s Croke Park fight sooner. He said negotiations with the stadium had sometimes weakened his confidence in the project.
I'm disappointed with myself that I allowed that to happen because maybe we could have done it earlier.
"People can sort of deflate your spirit, which is quite unusual for me," Hearn said. "They did deflate my spirit a bit over the years. They made me question whether we could do it or whether it would actually work."
He added: "I'm disappointed with myself that I allowed that to happen because maybe we could have done it earlier." Hearn also credited Croke Park for helping make the event happen in the end.
Listen, they [Croke Park] helped out as well, they were fantastic in the end.
About this summary
Originally published by RTÉ News in English. Translated, summarized, and contextualized automatically by DistantNews, with a note on how the source frames the story. Not individually reviewed before publishing. How this works.
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