Irish boxing, as things stand

Big Ears

This is just a thread to discuss general Irish boxing, our current top fighters and prospects, those coming through from the amateurs and the promoting and tv side to boxing in this country .

These are the current active Irish boxers .

Heavyweights: Kevin McBride, Martin Rogan, Declin Timlin, Scott Belshaw, Colin Kenna, John Timlin

Cruiserweights: John O'Brien, Darren Corbett, Mark Clancy, Michael Sweeney, Ian Tims, Jamie Power

Light Heavyweight: Keith Cresham , Alo Kelly(retired)

Super Middleweight: Brian Magee, Joe Rea, Leon Senior

Middleweight: John Duddy, Matthew Macklin, Andy Lee, Jim Rock, Simon O'Donnell

Light-Middleweight: James Moore, Henry Coyle, Ciaran Healy, Ciaran Duffy, Damian Taggart .

Welterweight: Stephen Haughian, Neil Sinclair, Billy Walsh, Gary O'Sullivan, Willie Thompson, Scott Jordan

Light-Welterweight: Paul McCloskey, Dean Byrne, James Gorman

Lightweight: Andrew Murray, Oisín Fagan, Michael Gomez, Peter McDonagh

Super-Featherweight: Eddie Hyland, Kevin O'Hara

Featherweight: Martin Lindsay, Patrick Hyland, Paul Griffin

Super-Bantamweight: Bernard Dunne, Paul Hyland, Wayne McCullough(retired ?)

Bantamweight: Luke Wilton, Colin Moffett, Eugene Heagney


Irish Champions-
Heavyweight: Kevin McBride
Cruiserweight: vacant(last held by Darren Corbett)
Light-Heavyweight: vacant(Jim Rock v Jonjo Finnegan)
Super-Middleweight: Andy Lee
Middleweight: Jim Rock
Light-Middleweight: Ciaran Healy
Welterweight: Billy Walsh
Light-Welterweight: Andrew Murray
Lightweight: Peter McDonagh(v Andrew Murray)
Super-Featherweight: Eddie Hyland
Featherweight: Patrick Hyland
Super-bantamweight: vacant(Paul Hyland v Marc Callaghan)
Bantamweight: Colin Moffett




The active promoters we have at the moment are: Brian Peters(Brian Peters promotions) , Gary Hyde(Nowhere to hyde promotions) , Paschal Collins , Tommy Egan(Tommy Egan Promotions) , Paddy Hyland , Alan/Jane Wilton(Belfast Boxing Promotions) .

With RTE 2 and TV 3 broadcasting any televised fights .

Big Ears

Now although we have no stand out fighter at the moment(such as McGuigan or Collins were in their time) , I feel we have a lot of strength in depth . Andy Lee was fancied by some here to be that standout fighter, and while he still may be yet I knew many people were getting carried away while huge flaws still existed . It was obvious he couldn't really fight on the inside , yet people were picking him to beat Macklin and Duddy and while neither of those may be good enough to win a World title they are above European class and able to get people to fight their fight(on the inside) .

Lee has a lot of potential though , and if Steward can fix the flaws(such as he did with Lewis and Wladamir) then there is no reason why Lee can't reach that original potential . Willie Gibbs will be a very good test .

Duddy, full of heart, drive, desire, keeps coming foward and never going to win a (genuine)World title because the only way you can be that good with such a porous defence is to have Julian Jackson type power and he simply doesn't . Capable of boxing well at times and a top 10 Middleweight who is good enough to win the European title or possibly pick up one of the alphabet baubles lying around but will never be good enough to beat the #1 man at Middleweight .

Macklin, similar characteristics to Duddy , punches a little harder and more capable of boxing to a gameplan . However his potential is only of a similar level to Duddy and he just isn't good enough when it comes to the very top. Disappointed he's gone with Frank Warren as I felt he was going the right direction over here , but maybe a British title shot might come his way soon and he won't be taken the WBU route .

Paul McCloskey , possibly the best prospect we have , seriously lacks power at World level but is as slick as they come and the fight with Nigel Wright will really show us his potential . I think he is capable of picking up one of the titles but like Duddy I'm not sure he'll ever be good enough for the main man in his division . But I'd give him a small chance of doing it , where as I give Duddy no chance .

more later.......

Mazletov

will jim rock's title be vacated with him moving to light-heavy? he's probably ireland's fourth best middleweight at the moment.

Big Ears

Mazletov wrote: »

will jim rock's title be vacated with him moving to light-heavy? he's probably ireland's fourth best middleweight at the moment.

Well seeing as Rock says this will probably be his last fight there is a good chance it will be vacated, otherwise he wouldn't have to .

It will be interesting to see Andrew Murray's performance against Peter McDonagh . Andrew is a technically very sound boxer(which is one reason why he was a good amateur) and very classy .
I have my doubts over his punching power and physical straight but they may be improved by him dropping down to Lightweight where he'll meet smaller opponents .

Should him and Oisín Fagan both with on the 12th though , then it is likely they will be matched in a fight for the Irish Lightweight title in the near future and Murray's punch and physical straight will be tested then as he'll be forced to keep the marauding Fagan off of him . If he's able to avoid getting involved with Fagan on the inside through skill alone and deal with him easily however that would be extremely impressive and something only World/Fringe World level fighters could do to Fagan .

Stephen Haughian is a fighter who looks quite promising to me, despite his recent loss(a close one) he seems to have plenty of ability and a nice style(similar to that of Steve Collins) . I think he has the potential to win a European title or at the very least get the better of 'them across the water' and gain British/Commonwealth titles . He's very strong , very rugged , nice tight guard and as shown a few days ago can finish when he gets a man hurt.

I'm hoping I get to see Gary 'Spike' O'Sullivan and Billy Walsh on the TV3 bill coming up . Walsh is the Irish Welterweight champion after only 5 fights and O'Sullivan has won all of his first 3 fights by knockout(including one over the very durable peter Dunn) so another knockout win could indicate the lad carries some power . I suppose those two could get matched together in the future too and with two Northern prospects coming through the ranks at the same time(Willie Thompson and Scott Jordan) we could have some interesting fights for that irish Welterweight title .

The Hylands' are finally starting to be kept more active too and are really starting to show potential . Eddie has come back from a very poor showing when losing to Stephen Mullin over in England to beating the useful Kevin O'Hara who is a good fighter for the Irish Super-Featherweight title .

Patrick crippled Paul Griffin with a body shot to win the Irish Featherweight title http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l5Mm6U94O5M seems a cracker while it lasted .

Finally Paul, the youngest and often though of as the best is getting his chance at an Irish title, taking on the experienced Marc Callaghan who's held the English Super-Bantamweight title and has wins over Sean Hughes, Ian Napa(Controversial), Andrew Ferrans and a draw with Michael Hunter . He's generally been beaten when he's stepped up in class but has mixed it with the best of British based fighters in Rendall Munroe, Jackson Asiku, John Simpson, Jamie McKeever, Roy Rutherford, Michael Hunter(twice), Ian Napa, Dazzo Williams, Esham Pickering and Martin Lindsay .

The reason he's got so many losses is the level of opposition has been consitantly high . However with that said Callaghan is a bit limited and a bit worn nowdays . A stoppage win would be very impressive but a win will be all Hyland will be concerned about .

Dean Byrne(who won the Austrailian Light-Welterweight title) has relocated to America and won his first fight there by 1st round stoppage . Byrne who had been out of action for almost a year is one of the secrets of Irish boxing . The word going round is that he's pretty decent and now that he's fighting in America it hopefully won't be too long till we find out .

sston

I'd like to see more of Dean Byrne over here. Never struck me as anything special as an amateur but seems to be creating a real buzz in the pros. I heard he was sparing Pacman for the Marquez fight. Himself and Murray or Fagan sound like good Irish title scraps.

Hero Of College

I am happy with the state of things. The Irish have always been receptive to the fight game, sometimes too receptive. Our ammys are set to do well in the Olymps and we have several well established pros. Keep it up!!!;)

Faro

What about Gomez? He sure put it up to Khan on Saturday - gave him one big fright. He can take some punishment. Age was against him though. Felt sorry for him when the ref stopped the fight.

joepenguin

Irish boxing looks great at the moment. Amatures doing brilliant and looking sharp before the olympics.
Regular boxing on RTE and hopefully it will go well on TV3. Even though there is no one big superstar as yet, as said before there is a good depth of talent that we should be proud of. I dont mind if they are not undisputed world champs but as long as most of the bouts are competitive, Ill watch them.

I think putting on Irish title fights more regularly is a good idea to get domestic rivalries going. We could even get a see a few trilogies!!!:eek:

Big Ears

Current World, European and European Union rankings for Irish boxers:
World ranked fighters:
WBC-
John Duddy(5th at Middle)
Brian Magee(20th at Light-Heavyweight)
Bernard Dunne(26th at Super-Bantamweight)
Andy Lee(26th at Middleweight)
*Paul McCloskey(40th last month now off the list)

WBO-
John Duddy(2nd at Middleweight
Bernard Dunne(12th at Super-Bantamweight)

IBF-
John Duddy(7th at Middleweight)

WBA-
Bernard Dunne(13th at Super-Bantamweight)

European ranked fighters:
Brian Magee(13th at Super-Middleweight)
Matthew Macklin(10th at Middleweight)
Andy Lee(11th at Middleweight)
*Jim Rock(previously 17th at Middle till he recently moved up)
Paul McCloskey(12th at Light-Welterweight)
Bernard Dunne(2nd at Super-Bantamweight)

European Union ranked fighters:
Brian Magee(8th at Super-Middleweight)
Matthew Macklin(8th at Middleweight)
Andy Lee(9th at Middleweight)
Neil Sinclair(20th at Welterweight)
Paul McCloskey(9th at Light-Welterweight)
Andrew Murray(20th at Lightweight)
Patrick Hyland(13th at Featherweight)
Bernard Dunne(3rd at Super-Bantamweight)
Paul Hyland(12th at Super-Bantamweight)


Irish fighters in the American rankings:

NABA-
John Duddy(1st at Middleweight)

NABF-
John Duddy(2nd at Middleweight)
James Moore(13th at Middleweight)
Wayne McCullough(15th at Featherweight)

NABO-
Andy Lee(7th at Middleweight)
Martin Lindsay(15th at Featherweight)

USBA-
Andy Lee(8th at Middleweight)



Fights coming up:
In Ireland-Gleneagle Hotel, Killarney 26th October:
Mike Perez
Francie Barrett
Gary O'Sullivan
Michael Sweeney
Ian Tims
Stephen Ormond
Anthony Fitzgerald
Willie Casey
John Waldron

Outside Ireland:
-Colin Kenna v Gurcharan Singh, tonight in Berkshire, England

- 4th of October, Philadelphia, USA
Paulie Hyland
Patrick Hyland
Simon O'Donnell

-5th of October, Watford, England
Leon Senior v Caine Brodie

-24th of October, York Hall Bethnal Green, London, England
Neil Sinclair-Prizefighter tournament

-31st of October, Birmingham, England
Matthew Macklin

-6th of November, New York, USA
John Duddy

-15th of November, London, England
Martin Lindsay

-6th of December, Nottingham England
Brian Magee v Steven McGuire-British Super-Middleweight title

walshb

Any date for Dunne's next bout?

Julio Zarate I think was mentioned!

Big Ears

walshb wrote: »

Any date for Dunne's next bout?

Julio Zarate I think was mentioned!

Sometime in November I think was the word going round but that's as far from solid info as you can get.

Ya Julio Zarate is the name going round and that is a proper fight, he's the type of guy people have consistently criticised Dunne for not fighting and tbh I'd have Zarate a bit of a favourite due to his extra power. Zarate had a great fight with Mayhar Monshipour a few years back when he fought for the WBA title and even managed to floor the iron chinned Frenchman before being stopped.

If he beats Zarate he'd actually deserve to be a voluntary defense of a title, unlike most European fighters who get their shot by virtue of being European champion.

alanceltic

Yeah its gonna be November but it wont be against Zarate

mike4819

Can anyone tell me the latest about Marty Rogan? Have his hands healed, when he's due to fight again?

Big Ears

Colin Kenna got knocked out in 4 rounds, which seems pretty much the end of his career.

Anyway October 4th, the Irish fighters opponents have been announced.
Paulie Hyland fights http://www.boxrec.com/list_bouts.php?human_id=272020&cat=boxer
Patrick fights http://www.boxrec.com/list_bouts.php?human_id=273793&cat=boxer
and Simon O'Donnell fights http://www.boxrec.com/list_bouts.php?human_id=368730&cat=boxer

Should be wins for all of them.

jayroyal

Big Ears wrote: »

Colin Kenna got knocked out in 4 rounds, which seems pretty much the end of his career.

Anyway October 4th, the Irish fighters opponents have been announced.
Paulie Hyland fights http://www.boxrec.com/list_bouts.php?human_id=272020&cat=boxer
Patrick fights http://www.boxrec.com/list_bouts.php?human_id=273793&cat=boxer
and Simon O'Donnell fights http://www.boxrec.com/list_bouts.php?human_id=368730&cat=boxer

Should be wins for all of them.

Look at paulie's opponent won 13 from 14 in colombia the first seven by straight ko's then has only won once in the states since.Do they make these records up or what:eek:. Maybe it's all done as a set up to get a visa into the states.Pretty amazing eh.
Anyway why ain't they setting paulie up even a little bit for god sake, he's the cutie's boxer and he's well behind the other two in terms of opponents faced this far.

Big Ears

jayroyal wrote: »

Look at paulie's opponent won 13 from 14 in colombia the first seven by straight ko's then has only won once in the states since.Do they make these records up or what:eek:. Maybe it's all done as a set up to get a visa into the states.Pretty amazing eh.
Anyway why ain't they setting paulie up even a little bit for god sake, he's the cutie's boxer and he's well behind the other two in terms of opponents faced this far.

Tbh I'm starting to think Patrick might be the best of the lot and he's getting tested quite a bit more than Paulie. Paulie's opponent on the last bill was meant to be a lot better but he pulled out at very short notice.

Flores has mixed it in very good company, but unfortunately other than fight scrubs back home that's pretty much all he's done. The notable result there is he lost a mixed decision to David Martinez(the guy who fought Dunne) two years ago.
Another is the draw with Luis Melendez back home in Columbia early in his career. Melendez is a Super-Flyweight(like Flores seemingly), he gave Fernando Montiel a very good fight recently and all of Flores' losses are to fighters with good winning records.

Raul Martinez, Fernando Beltran, |Rey Bautista, Gabriel Elizondo are all very good fighters.

I would like to see a step up in opposition, but on the bright side this is his 3rd fight in as many months, and this is still probably 2nd/3rd best guy he's faced.

Maybe one more fight before the end of the year, with a slight step up in quality or else someone else at the level of Callaghan again at least, and then a decent step up early next year to push him on towards European level.

Big Ears

Paulie Hyland lost to Lucien Gonzalez on points last night, he was dropped in the process.
Can't say I'm too surprised, as good as Paulie looked there was something about him which made me feel all was not right.

Patrick won by ko in 2 and Simon O'Donnell won by 5th round stoppage.

Dunne is fighting on the 15th of November in Castlebar, Henry Coyle will be on the undercard.

joepenguin

Thats not good news at all. Did he look like he had an off night or something?

Big Ears

With the developments over the past 6 months it's time for an update.

Heavyweight:
Martin Rogan, Scott Belshaw, Coleman Barrett, Declan Timlin, Colin Kenna

Cruiserweight:Ian Tims, Jon O'Brien, Mark Clancy, Darren Corbett, Colm Keane, Josh Rutgers

Light-Heavyweight:Michael Sweeney, Jaimie Power, Leon Senior, John Waldron, Keith Cresham

Super-Middleweight: Brian Magee, Jim Rock, Darren Sutherland,

Middleweight: Matthew Macklin, Andy Lee, John Duddy,Jason McKay, Simon O'Donnell, Joe Rea, Robert Long, Anthony Fitzgerald

Light-Middleweight: James Moore, Gary O'Sullivan, Henry Coyle, Ciaran Healy, Scott Jordan, Ciaran Duffy

Welterweight: Stephen Haughian, Neil Sinclair, Willie Thompson, Billy Walsh, Damien Taggert

Light-Welterweight: Paul McCloskey, Peter McDonagh, Dean Byrne, James Gorman

Lightweight: Andy Murray, Oisín Fagan, Michael Kelly, Steven Ormond, Kevin Maxwell, Gary Hamilton

Super-Featherweight: Eddie Hyland, Kevin O'Hara

Featherweight: Martin Lindsay, Patrick Hyland, Willie Casey

Super-bantamweight: Bernard Dunne

Bantamweight:Paul Hyland, Colin Moffett, Eugene Heagney

Flyweight: Luke Wilton

First of all I have to comment how good it is to have so many pro Irish fighters at the moment, now that there are a frequent amount of cards within Ireland pro boxing is an option for Irish boxers without them having to move abroad.

Secondly I think with the huge amount of Irish fighters there, plus the huge number of fighters with Irish connections, that Irish title fights really should become more common.
Especially when you consider the following fighters are all eligible for the Irish title:

Cruiserweight:Bobby Gunn
Light-heavyweight: Jonjo Finnegan
Middleweight: Danny Thornton, Michael Monaghan, Martin Murray
Light-Middleweight: Jamie Moore, Thomas McDonagh, Lee Murtagh
Light-Welterweight: Danny O'Connor
Super-Featherweight:Logan McGuinness, Liam Walsh, Jamie McKeever
Featherweight: Ryan Walsh
Super-Bantamweight: Stuart McFadyen, Marc Callaghan
Bantamweight: Martin Power, Michael Walsh

among others, so there's real potential to build a strong domestic Irish scene with good Irish title fights.

Situation with our top fighters:
Heavyweight- Martin Rogan is current Commwealth champion having beaten both Audley Harrison and Matt Skelton(at the time European champion. He's defending his title against British Southern Area champion Sam Sexton in a few weeks.

Ranked 11th by the WBO and 24th by the WBC and 2nd in Europe

Super-Middleweight- Brian Magee recently vacated his British title, although should be fighting now champion Tony Quigley in a voluntary soon.

Ranked 15th by the WBC at Light-heavyweight, and is 5th in the European rankings at Super-Middleweight.

Middleweight- Matthew Macklin, recently knocked out Wayne Elcock to win the British Middleweight title. Will be defending against Steve Bendall soon.
ranked 16th by the WBC and 6th in Europe.

Andy Lee badly struggled in beating former European title challenger Alexander Sipos. Will be headlining a card in New York in the next few months.
Ranked 30th by the WBC and 9th in Europe

John Duddy suffered a huge setback last night in losing to journeyman Billy Lyell. Who knows what he'll do next.
Was ranked 2nd by the WBO, 4th by the WBC and 6th by the IBF, all those will presumely vanish although he may hold onto a top 40 place in the WBC.

Light-Welterweight: Paul McCloskey, become British champion by stopping Colin Lynes and looked very good in his first defence. Should be fighting for the vacant European title next, probably against Junior Witter.
Ranked 19th by the WBC and mandatory for the European title.

Lightweight: Andrew Murray recently won the European Union title with a win over former Spanish champion Daniel Rasilla. Didn't look that impressive and still needs to be tested against a rough and tough opponent with a bit of quality. Not a bad prospect as far as the European title goes though.

Ranked 38th by the WBC, and 10th in Europe.

Featherweight: Martin Lindsay now British champion having stopped Paul Appleby in 6 rounds and previously defeating Derry Matthews in 9 to gain that chance. Before tonight he was ranked 9th by the IBF, 15th by the WBO and 5th in Europe(Appleby was #2)

Super-Bantamweight: Bernard Dunne, won the WBA regular title in an 11 round war with Panamanian Ricardo Cordoba. What he'll do next who knows.

That's what the main guys have done we still have guys like Patrick Hyland and Stephen Haughian who could join this list within the next year if they can achieve something big. James Moore would of been on a list like this after the Candelo win, but his stock has dropped dramatically as he has really been shown up in recent times. I'd be surprised to see him make it back on a list like this.