Banagher rises to favourite son as Fr Pepper proves too hot for rival

It was white-collar boxing Banagher-style and there could be only one winner, local curate Fr Pierre Pepper.

The culmination of weeks of rigorous training, and a series of bad-tempered video exchanges between Fr 'Jalapeno' Pepper and Jared 'Artful Dodger' Madden, the fight took place in the Co Offaly town on Saturday night.

This mother-of-all boxing matches lasted through a harrowing three, three-minute rounds and ended, finally, in a points victory for the priest.

Over recent months ugly video insults were generously exchanged by both contenders who both also survived a testy duel of pithy biblical quotations as well as horrific scenes at the Battle of Banagher Bridge on February 15th last.

There Madden’s ‘Sisters of No Mercy’, attired in black and white habits, clashed violently with Pepper’s white-collared ‘Brother Hood’, but the result was inconclusive.

An earlier video from the 'Sisters' preached Beat it, Michael Jackson-style, at the Brothers of the 'Hood'.

Holy show

Advance publicity for this most acrimonious fight also included the contenders making a holy show of themselves on The Late Late Show last month, not to mention the BBC and YouTube, as well as attracting the interest of international press agencies before which they disgraced themselves again.

Gracious towards his opponent, even in victory, Fr Pepper commented to The Irish Times yesterday "I slaughtered him."

He also admitted trying to knock out his rival “but I couldn’t get a swing at his head.”

He then went off to continue Mother’s Day celebrations with his mother and family members.

The fight took place at a marquee in the grounds of JJ Hough’s pub in Banagher and was one of 13 on the night organised to raise funds for the local St Vincent de Paul and research into Motor Neurone disease.

So far no one has dared suggest a rematch, and that bates Banagher.