Euphoric scenes as McGuigan triumphs

FROM THE ARCHIVE: CONOR O'CLERY was among the ecstatic crowd that hailed Barry McGuigan's win over Eusebio Pedroza in QPR's football ground in London

THE PARTY goes on. London was still full of celebrating Irish fans yesterday after Barry McGuigan took the World Featherweight Boxing Championship at 10.55 on Saturday evening at Queens Park Rangers’ football ground (Loftus Road). Dancing green laser beams vied with the hoarse cheers of 25,000 people to split the cold London night air in wild exultation.

“I’m so delighted. Oh God, I’m so pleased,” said the 24-year-old Clones boxer as he heard the unanimous verdict that he had won on points.

All around the ringside, men and women, most of whom seemed to come from Northern Ireland, embraced each other, did triumphal dances and jumped in the air, arms outstretched in pure joy. It was 10 minutes before Barry could make his way back to the dressingroom where he found the Taoiseach on the telephone.

“Ireland is proud of you,” said Dr FitzGerald. “And I’m proud to be Irish,” said McGuigan.

The party in the stadium got under way long before the fight began. The confidence of the fans was overwhelming, the prospect of defeat for McGuigan unthinkable, even treacherous.

The early bouts were practically ignored as the stands filled up and more and more voices contributed to the waves of chanting the on-line refrain of McGuigan supporters: “Here we go, here we go,” occasionally alternating with “Barr-ee, we do, oh Barr-ee, we love you.”

At 9.44pm Barry appeared in his blue and gold dressing gown, walking behind the now customary blue flag of peace, to the strains of the theme music from Rocky. The noise reached a pitch which didn’t abate until 9.50 when the fighters and their teams were in the ring and Barry’s father, Pat, took the microphone to sing Danny Boy.

The champion, Eusebio Pedroza, all alone in this hostile cauldron, responded by turning his head and staring at McGuigan throughout as if to psyche him.

The cheering continued with varying intensity through each of the 15 rounds as Barry bullied Pedroza around the ring in a flurry of aggression. It dropped once to a sudden stomach-turning silence as McGuigan appeared to falter in the fifth round, then roared up to new decibel levels as the Monaghan man knocked the Panamanian down in the seventh .

The hundreds of fans sitting in rows within 60 feet of the fight jumped up on the yellow plastic chairs described as “ringside seats”, for which they had paid £100 each, and punched the air with their fists.

We all sensed for sure that McGuigan was going to win when he started grinning down at the world snooker champion, Dennis Taylor from Coalisland, Co Tyrone, in his ringside seat between the last few rounds. These two men from the province of Ulster, both patently nice, likeable, dedicated sportsmen, have within six weeks come to England to win world championships, uniting all parts of Ireland.

The political unity of the support behind McGuigan found expression on Saturday night in the presence of an Irish and a British junior Minister cheering him on in the crowd, Donal Creed from the Department of Education and Nicholas Scott from the Northern Ireland Office.

Another great Ulster-born sportsman was also in the crowd, goalkeeper Pat Jennings from Newry, Co Down, who had the misfortune to be seated at the end of the row of seats on the pitch, allowing a queue of autograph hunters to form beside him long before the fight began. He was still signing programmes after McGuigan had gone back to the dressingroom.

Former featherweight champions Terry Downs and Alan Minter were there. As was Henry Cooper, whose knock-down of Mohammed Ali was the last great London boxing occasion. “Barry, you were magnificent,” said Henry afterwards. “We ain’t half proud, son.”

When it was over, dozens of young men rushed the ring, breaking telephones as they clambered over reporters’ tables.

Several of the plastic seats collapsed under the strain of feet jumping up and down. Drink had been banned from the ground, but all around me, flat, half bottles of brandy and whisky were being tipped back.

In the middle of the chaos, McGuigan remembered the tragedy which has haunted his professional career, the death of an opponent, Young Ali, the Nigerian, in 1982.

McGuigan said. “It was not just any fighter who beat him but the world champion. He did not die in vain.”

Barry McGuigan, his wife Sandra, and son Blain, retired to the Holiday Inn Hotel in Park Lane, where the management threw a private party for the families and for the Eastwood clan.

The latter, along with McGuigan, are now considerably richer from an hour of the finest world-class boxing, seen live in 11 countries, including the United States, where the big money lies for future McGuigan promotions.