Latest news with #BarryMcGuigan
BBC News
4 days ago
- Sport
- BBC News
'Vivid memories burned into your brain' - McGuigan reflects on Pedrosa fight
In an interview with BBC Sport NI's Thomas Niblock, forty years on, Barry McGuigan reflects on the night when a UK television audience of 19 million watched him beat Panamanian fighter Eusebio Pedrosa to win the world title at Loftus Road on 8 June 1985.
BBC News
4 days ago
- Sport
- BBC News
Dubois beating Usyk would be 'no surprise at all'
Former world champion Barry McGuigan says he would not be "at all surprised" if big-hitting Daniel Dubois beats Oleksandr Usyk in this summer's undisputed heavyweight title fight. Briton Dubois, the IBF belt holder, and WBA, WBO and WBC champion Usyk will meet for the second time on 19 July at Wembley Stadium after Usyk's ninth-round stoppage victory in August 2023. And while McGuigan - whose son Shane formerly trained Dubois - is still backing the undefeated Ukrainian to win, he expects the 27-year-old Londoner to provide a much sterner test than he did in their first bout in Poland. "Dubois can knock the house down, he hits so hard," former featherweight champion McGuigan told BBC Sport NI's Thomas Niblock. "Shane, my son, got him across the line. We went out to Miami, he knocked out Trevor Bryan Jr to win the WBA regular title (in 2022). "He is a big, strong, powerful heavyweight. A modern-day heavyweight, 18-and-a-half stone, 6ft 4ins, built like the proverbial out-house. A massive guy and could knock the wall down with a right hand or a left hook." McGuigan, who has helped mentor Dubois' sister Caroline Dubois, acknowledged the "significant" power difference between former cruiserweight Usyk and the British fighter, who weighed in at almost 18 stone for his stunning knockout victory over Anthony Joshua last September. However, the 64-year-old Irishman feels 38-year-old Usyk is "too clever" to allow Dubois a clean shot. "When the big guys hit you, you stay hit. I think Usyk, with the experience he's had, has got better. "It's a more difficult fight because Usyk has got older and Dubois is still very young. For me, they've gotten closer so the fight will be closer. If Usyk gets hit clean by Dubois, the fight is over, but he'll not get hit like that, he's too clever. "Dubois will want to work on his body, put him under pressure. That whole friction is going to be very exciting."McGuigan added: "I think Usyk will win this time, I'm not sure if he'll stop him, but it could be a wide points decision." McGuigan was speaking in an interview to mark the 40th anniversary of his famous world-title triumph over mighty Panamanian fighter Eusebio the Irishman prevailed at Loftus Road on 8 June 1985, it was watched by a UK television audience of 19 million people. Now the sport is dominated by pay-per-view bouts, with increasing influence from figures such as Turki Alalshikh, the chairman of Saudi Arabia's general entertainment authority, funded by Saudi's Public Investment Fund, which is reported to have spent more than £5bn on sport."He wants to make it [Saudi Arabia] the centre of big sporting events and fair dues to him, the fighters are getting paid much better as a result of that, the coming together of Eddie Hearn and Frank Warren, so that's a good thing for the game," observed McGuigan. "It's good that there's more money involved for the fighters, it's a dangerous and serious business so it's good that they're making better money than they did in the past. "What it does is it takes down the barrier of these guys wanting to fight each other. If he pays him enough they'll say 'yes, I'm in' so we get WBA champions fighting WBC champions and IBF champions fighting WBO champions."
The Sun
22-05-2025
- Entertainment
- The Sun
Emotional moment Eamonn Holmes fights back tears on his podcast – hours after dramatic on-screen fall
EAMONN Holmes fought back tears on his podcast - just hours after his dramatic fall live on air. The presenter, 65, ended up on his back on set just two weeks after he was rushed to hospital in another fall. 4 4 Eamonn was hailed as a "trooper" by his colleagues - who praised him for keeping calm and carrying on. Just hours after the accident, the broadcaster was left in floods of tears as he remembered his late father during a podcast interview with former boxer Barry McGuigan. On Thursday, Eamonn was filming the second episode for his Things We Like podcast when an story about Barry's father, Pat - who passed away at the age of 52 - appeared visibly upset. Eamonn recalled how Barry's father would sing the traditional Irish melody Danny Boy from the ring before many of his fights. Eamonn said: "Your dad was a special man. I know he was very special to you. "Barry used to come out to the ring to Danny Boy; it would be emotional, I'm sure Barry's the same." Eamonn fought back tears and he added: "It brings tears to my eyes, because of my own dad, for reasons I won't go into." He then asked Barry, who won the British featherweight title in 1983, how emotional that was for him. Barry also struggled to speak, with his voice breaking, he said: "My old man. My dad was very important to me." He paused for a moment before he continued and said: "He saw me winning the world title and he died unfortunately at 52. "So he was only a young man. But he was great, he was a really big part of my life." Singer Pat, who represented Ireland at the 1968 Eurovision Song Contest, died in 1987 following a period of ill health. While Eamonn's father Leonard suffered a fatal heart attack while driving in the countryside of Northern Ireland aged 65 and recalled the harrowing experience in his 2006 autobiography, This Is My Life. SAD LOSS The presenter had been in London over Easter in 1991 when his parents and younger brother Conor spent the weekend in their caravan in seaside town Ballycastle, Antrim. Following the weekend, Eamonn called his parent's home on April 3 hoping to hear all about their trip however there was no answer, nor to the call he made 30 minutes later. At 7pm that night, Eamonn received a phonecall from his other brother Colm who told him of their father's death after he had taken ill returning from their trip. The broadcaster wrote in his book that his father became unwell suddenly and had pulled over on the road and couldn't move from the driver's seat - but on a country road and without a phone the wasn't much Eamonn's mother Josie could do. By chance a family friend, John Linehan, had been visiting the area and came to their aid while they waited for the ambulance to arrive. Eamonn wrote: "When John got to the car, Daddy was still in the driver's seat. Mum had already flagged someone down who telephoned for help. "Conor, loyal to the end, took on the role of an adult and was still on the back seat, leaning over holding on to his dad. He continued: "He grew up a lot that night. Realising his distress, John steered him away from what was going on. He then knelt beside Dad. "As they waited for an ambulance, John kept talking to him until he became unconscious. He tried to resuscitate him but by the time the ambulance crew got there it was too late. "At sixty-five years old, before he could retire from work and spend many more days with Mum, a heart attack had taken my dad away from us." Upon hearing the devastating news, Eamonn rushed to Heathrow airport and managed to get on the final flight to Belfast so he could be with his family. The TV star said that his mother Josie never got over Leonard's death, while Eamonn explained that he never got over the grief of seeing his father's body in the mortuary. EAMONN'S FALL Eamonn's emotional podcast recording comes after he fell off his chair on GB News. Speaking at the end of the show, Eamonn told viewers: "The chair gave way and I was lying flat on my back with my head hanging off the set. "The first hour or so I was OK because the adrenaline kicked in, but then as the morning went on I felt the aches and pains. "The worst thing is that two weeks ago I was hospitalised for a similar fall in the same area, back of my neck, head and shoulders and that's all come back." He added: "We're going to have to replace the chairs because I'm not the only one to have fallen." Commentator Charlie Rowley, who was on-screen when Eamonn fell this morning, also paid tribute to the veteran host. He wrote on X: "Eamonn, you are the real hero for carrying on this morning. "A true professional and National Treasure who I learn from each and every week. It's a privilege working with you, Ellie Costello and the rest of the GB News family. Take care!" At the end of the show, in conversation with colleagues Andrew Pierce and Bev Turner, Bev told viewers: "Now, if you weren't watching earlier this morning, you will have missed our resident stunt man, Eamonn Holmes. "Eamonn, as we know, struggles with his health at the moment. He has some good days, he has some bad days. Well this morning it turned out it was a bad day." "Unfortunately we have these chairs on wheels so we can jump in and out quickly. "We have to jump to the camera, we have to nip out to the loo sometimes, and sometimes we have 30 seconds to do that. "Eamonn pushed his chair back this morning and ended up on the floor." Andrew continued: "Eamonn was flat out, 180 degree angle, saying 'carry on'. "He shouted from under the desk, he did carry on and he got up and carried on with the show. What a trooper he is." 4
Daily Mail
22-05-2025
- Entertainment
- Daily Mail
Eamonn Holmes fights back tears as he remembers his late father during emotional podcast chat - hours after tumbling from his chair on live TV
Eamonn Holmes was reduced to tears as he remembered his late father during a podcast interview with former boxer Barry McGuigan on Thursday - hours after tumbling from his chair on live TV. Holmes was hosting the second instalment of his Things We Like podcast with GB News colleague Paul Coyte when an anecdote about McGuigan's own father, Pat - who passed away at the age of 52 - left him visibly moved. Discussing the former boxer's extraordinary rise to lineal heavyweight champion, Holmes - whose dad Leonard died aged 64 in 1990 - recalled how Pat would sing the anthemic Danny Boy from the ring before many of his son's fights. 'Your dad was a special man,' he said. 'I know he was very special to you. Barry used to come out to the ring to Danny Boy; it would be emotional, I'm sure Barry's the same.' Fighting back tears, he added: 'It brings tears to my eyes, because of my own dad, for reasons I won't go into.' From A-list scandals and red carpet mishaps to exclusive pictures and viral moments, subscribe to the Daily Mail's new showbiz newsletter to stay in the loop. Eamonn Holmes was reduced to tears as he remembered his late father during a podcast interview with former boxer Barry McGuigan on Thursday Pat, a successful singer who represented Ireland at the 1968 Eurovision Song Contest, died in 1987 aged just 52 following a period of poor health. Holmes' father Leonard also died young after suffering a fatal heart attack while driving. Discussing his sudden death during appearance on Irish show The Meaning Of Life in 2021, he said: 'He's been gone 31 years now but I still miss him every day. 'I can't recall my late father without thinking of how he always wanted to provide… even when I had a successful career. I think like all of us he just liked to be needed.' Describing a vivid memories of his dad, while choking back tears, Holmes said: 'All he did was give us a big hug, or whatever... 'All he did was say things like: "Do you need any money?" I was on Ulster Television, earning £12,000 a year. He wasn't earning £12,000 a year or anything near it. 'One day my mum said: "Let him give you some money". I did. I was like "yeah dad" and he'd give me twenty quid.' Holmes also admitted the hardest part about losing his dad so suddenly was being unable to say goodbye. Ahead of the show airing on RTÉ One, he tweeted a video clip except and wrote: 'He's been gone 31 years now but I still miss him every day. 'I can't recall my late father without thinking of how he always wanted to provide, even when I had a successful career. I think like all of us he just liked to be needed.' The podcast was released shortly after Holmes' admitted he was feeling 'really sore following a fall on live TV. The Northern Irish broadcaster added that it was 'a bit of a shock' considering he had been taken to hospital earlier in the month after he had a fall at his home. During Wednesday's instalment of the GB News show he co-hosts with Ellie Costello, a crash could be heard while the camera was focused on their guest, commentator Charlie Rowley. Costello could be heard saying 'oh my gosh' off-screen, and Holmes pleaded with Rowley to 'carry on' before the presenter returned to the show following a break. Holmes said: 'Welcome back. Good to see you again. Especially good for me to see you again. I am still alive, yes. 'And they're very wonky wheels on chairs that we've got here, and matter of fact, we don't really like the chairs full stop, do we? They're a bit slippy and slidey and I've slipped and slid off mine there.' Ahead of the show airing on RTÉ One, he tweeted a video clip except and wrote: 'He's been gone 31 years now but I still miss him every day' He continued: 'Not the first guest to have done so, we've had a few, they have to remain nameless because they're well known people, but they've hit the floor really badly, quite frightening. 'And it was a bit of a shock for me because I've had a fall in my bathroom two weeks ago, which hospitalised me, and that hit me again right in the back. (I'm) really, really sore. Really sore.' He later said the chair 'gave way' which meant he was lying flat on his back. He added: 'As the morning goes on, you feel aches and pains. The worst thing about this, of course, this was at a time when I was hospitalised two weeks ago for a very similar fall in the same area, back of the head, my neck, my shoulders. So it all came back, as it were.'
Irish Daily Mirror
03-05-2025
- Irish Daily Mirror
Barry McGuigan recalls his greatest night and the tragedies that followed
When we were children we used to play this game called Find The Bomb. The rules were simple. As we lived in a bungalow with a huge, single-glazed, front window, any time a bomb went off, which was often enough back in 1980s-Ulster, the glass would vibrate. When it did so, we had to guess the explosion's location. Belfast, 27 miles away, was an obvious choice, but as the years passed we began to realise that Dungannon, Newry, Armagh city or Lisburn were just as likely to be victims of terror. And because this all happened in the pre-digital age, and there was no social media, we had to wait until the following evening's news to discover where the bomb had exploded and which of us three brothers had guessed accurately. Looking back now, it's excruciatingly embarrassing to think how warped our little minds had become, such little empathy shown to the possibilities of a loss of life or livelihoods. But the North did that to you. It darkened your humour as well as your mood. Playing Find The Bomb, or having a gun pointed at you by a British Army soldier, was something we considered normal. And that was the biggest trick Northern Ireland ever played on you. You did ordinary things, like go to school, to the shops, to the cinema and convince yourself there was nothing different about living up there. Except tragedy could sometimes strike; someone never made it home. There was a man who lived next door who lost his father to the bullet of a UVF psychopath. A friend at school lost his father, another his home, in bomb blasts. Another year, our milkman and his family were shot. One survived, three did not. Whenever I think back to that brutal period, it is as if you are entering a twilight world where you feel the need to glance over your shoulder to make sure no one is following you. Northern Ireland was just that kind of place; tense, unruly, paranoid, broken. And then a little man from Clones came along and started putting the pieces back together. The impact Barry McGuigan had on my life was profound because ordinarily the people who influence you the most tend to be those you know; a parent or relative, a teacher or a coach. Yet such was the magnetism of this fighter's personality that it felt like everyone in Ulster knew him. He may have been 5 '6 but he was a big rather than a small man. You see McGuigan was Irish but fought for British titles, a Catholic who married a Protestant. He had supporters clubs in the nationalist Falls Road and also the loyalist Shankill. And when he fought for a world title in 1985, he didn't do so under the Union Jack or Tricolour but instead the blue flag of peace. 'People might have thought it was a gimmick but it was far from that,' he says now, on the eve of the 40th anniversary of that title win over Eusebio Pedroza, the Panamanian. 'I was aware I had incredible unity within my support. 'They had spent four years travelling with me as my career progressed from local to European then to world level. 'So, I was really conscious that we had all these people spending their hard earned money and that I was representing them. 'You know, people were dying every day in the North. The trouble and the bitterness was savage. I was sick to death of it. I was thinking 'ah for f**k's sake, this is just awful'. 'So Barney (Eastwood, his manager) and I agreed that I would wear blue, as in the United Nations colour. We had the dove of peace woven onto my shorts. For the world title fights my father (who once represented Ireland in the Eurovision Song Contest) sang Danny Boy. 'We were not going to sing The Soldier Song and we certainly weren't going to sing God Save the Queen. People said that dad singing Danny Boy as a compromise was contrived. That's a load of nonsense. 'We did it on the spur of the moment and stood by our principle that we were not going to get involved in politics because I did not want to insult people. And the fans respected me for that which meant an awful lot. I am very proud of what I achieved.' Those achievements stretched beyond the ring. Inside it, he was a champion, a fast-moving, hard hitting featherweight, whose relentless pressure had the dual effect of putting opponents on their bums and getting fans off their seats. Like all pro boxers, his progress was measured, crossroads fights against journeymen initially, then hand-picked opponents who boasted better CVs than their talent merited. Then, as the crowds got bigger, the venue changed, Eastwood buying the boxing license off an old time promoter to allow McGuigan fight in the King's Hall, which had a larger capacity than the more modestly sized Ulster Hall. And all this while Northern Ireland continued to tear itself apart, McGuigan's pro career overlapping with the Hunger Strikes, the Maze Escape, the Anglo-Irish Agreement, the Brighton, Enniskillen, Newry, Hyde Park, Ballykelly bombings, and periodic massacres right across the province. As a child growing up in that place, life wasn't scary but it was draining. One set of politicians were angry, the other angrier, none of them impressive. McGuigan did inspire, though, the irony remaining that this little man punched people inside a ring but preached peace outside of it. This is Gerry Callan, Irish boxing's greatest aficionado: 'Not only was it essential for Ulster to have a person like Barry McGuigan at that time but it was vital for the entire island. 'Nobody's religion or politics came into it. Barry's fights were sporting events and that was it. Boxing, thankfully, has always been able to cross borders, not just geographic ones, but religious borders, too.' Everything started to come together. By 1981, when McGuigan first fought in Belfast as a pro, the country was crying out for a hero because it had too many villains. In the previous decade, when the violence was at its worst, several countries refused to travel to play internationals against Northern Ireland. Ulster's rugby team, similarly, had to deal with no-shows. So, a sporting void existed and McGuigan and his streetwise promoter, Eastwood, were willing to fill it. Within a year of turning pro, he had fought 11 times, building momentum and a support base. Then tragedy struck in his 12th fight when his Nigerian opponent, Young Ali, died from the injuries he sustained in the ring. Devastated, McGuigan considered retirement, confiding publicly about the trauma he was enduring, and a nation, deeply affected by terrorism's daily grind, empathised. The crowds for his fights started to increase. Five thousand saw him defeat an Italian, Valeri Nati, in 1983, an additional couple of thousand there to see him knock over well regarded opponents, Charm Chiteule, Jose Caba, Paul DeVorce and Felipe Orazco. By now it was 1985 and NBC, the United States broadcaster, wanted to see what all the fuss was, sending their cameras, complete with star pundit, Sugar Ray Leonard, across to Belfast for a world title eliminator against Juan LaPorte. That was when your correspondent got his first taste of big-time boxing, my father securing a ticket for a tenner, just hours before the first bell. A year earlier he had taken me to Windsor Park where new phrases entered my lexicon, as each Catholic player on the Northern Ireland team was dubbed a 'fenian c**t' by some of his own supporters. Fight night was different, though. There was no sectarianism in the King's Hall. Instead there were chants of Here We Go. Sitting on the rafters, we saw McGuigan outclass LaPorte, surviving the Puerto Rican's heavy fists in the ninth when he momentarily thought he was in Mrs Keenan's toy shop back in Clones. 'That was my greatest performance,' he says. But the win over Pedroza was his greatest night. Nineteen million people tuned in on TV, 22,000 packing QPR's Loftus Road stadium, including - once again - your correspondent. London differed to the North in that ten-year-old's eyes. There was no army on the streets for a start. Policemen didn't carry guns. The threat of death didn't surround you. But a sense of wonder did. My father had sacrificed a week's wages to get tickets and transport for the pair of us, £50-a-piece for the ferry to Stranraer, bus to London, ticket in the back row of the stand. And all these years later, as Gerry Callan, McGuigan and myself reminisced about those heady days, the conversation turned to the men who reared us. Sadness abounds. McGuigan's father, Pat, the man who sang Danny Boy, died within 18 months of his son's win. Tragically, Gerry's father didn't even last that long. As a retirement present for their father, Gerry and his sister had booked flights, hotels and ringside seats for his fellow Monaghan man's big night. On the way home from Loftus Road, Gerry's dad was mugged, dying of a heart attack just hours later. For Gerry, Ireland's Mr Boxing, the memory of that night is traumatic and bittersweet. For here was a Carrickmacross man whose love of the sweet science began when Freddie Gilroy went on a 21-fight winning streak in the 1960s. His dad had co-founded St Saviour's Club in Dublin's northside, Gerry the unofficial maintenance boy. By 1985, he had seen thousands of Irish fighters but just one become a world champion. Now there were two, McGuigan reaching his potential with a mix of skill and heart. But within hours of his friend's greatest night, came his saddest. Gerry says: 'My dad had arranged to meet an old work colleague, Tommy, in the hotel after the fight. Tommy told me how dad came in disorientated and bedraggled. 'It turned out he was mugged on the way back to the hotel and under the law of Britain and Ireland if a person dies as a commission of a crime, it is murder. Legally and technically my father was murdered. 'Our mother had died two years and two weeks before dad's death. We watched her die for seven years, suffering awfully with cancer and strokes. So if you have got to go, it (a heart attack) is not a bad way to go but it is still brutal.' Brutal, life changing lows followed McGuigan, too. He lost his father and a brother, and then, in 2019, his daughter, Nika. Two months ago, a brother in law also died and was cremated a few days before we spoke. 'I am so sad because I have lost so many people in the last decade. We had a particularly bad time in the last six years. So, when I look back at the Pedroza win, it's with a huge degree of sadness. 'It is sad to reflect knowing so many people have gone. I have had amazing times but also very low times.' Still, he's grateful for what he did, acknowledging the role Eastwood played in his rise, irrespective of the bitter falling out the two went through in 1986 and 1987. 'I'm neither stupid nor stubborn enough to ignore how good Barney was for me, and how good boxing was for me,' he says. Yet it goes both ways. In our country's darkest decade, he was a symbol of hope as well as of peace. Two days after defeating Pedroza, 75,000 people gathered in Belfast's Royal Avenue to welcome him home, another 30,000 people there in Clones when he got back there. Next to Dublin, where a quarter of a million people lined the pavements from O'Connell Street to the Mansion House. There and then, Barry McGuigan was Ireland's most popular man. 'It really meant something to Ireland and I am very proud of that. Here I am at 64, I am very fortunate to still be here because the nature of the boxing business is that it eats you up. "It is thrilling and incredible b ut the aftermath is not good. Guys who were great champions often don't cope with life after boxing. So, I am very fortunate to still be here and to still have my lucidity. 'I'll never forget what Barney said when he persuaded me to sign with him after the Moscow Olympics. 'We can resurrect boxing in Belfast, boy,' he said. 'And by God we did that.' Barry McGuigan will be celebrating the 40th anniversary of his epic win over Pedroza with a dinner show at the Premier Suite in Cannock, Staffordshire. See info@ for ticket details Get the latest sports headlines straight to your inbox by signing up for free email.
