Katie Taylor’s Fairytale homecoming | The fight that put women’s boxing on the map - The Sports Agents

**Gabby** (0:02)
This is a Global Production.
But also, Deirdre, just a final thing. On top of all the boxing, just to add to how amazing you are and your life has been, when you talked about being a graphic designer, you were an illustrator on the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. You never got into that.

**Deirdre Gogarty** (0:20)
Yeah. Well, that was just the day job.
We were booed on our way to the ring. I mean, nobody wanted to see two women slap each other around before a Tyson fight. I wasn't like really thinking, oh, this is going to be the fight that makes women's boxing, you know, because we had no idea.

**Gabby** (0:39)
When you became a world champion, women were still not allowed to box back in Ireland.

**Mark** (0:44)
A letter arrived from a young girl, and that girl was Katie Taylor.

**Deirdre Gogarty** (0:49)
Well, I have it right here. Maybe one day they'll even let us box in the Olympics.

**Gabby** (0:55)
Oh, my word, that got goosebumps.

**Deirdre Gogarty** (0:58)
No other woman should have to go through everything I've gone through. If I go through all of this, and the one that comes behind me, and the one after that, if they still got to go through all this, then what have I really accomplished? Imagine if Katie Taylor wasn't allowed to box. What a tragedy that would have been.

**Mark** (1:27)
Hello, and welcome to The Sports Agents. Hi Mark, in the same studio?

**Gabby** (1:30)
Again, this is just now, this is three shows on the trot, I think.

**Mark** (1:34)
You're going to get a restraining order from me, aren't you, Sue?
Look, I think we've got such a special story to talk about, and such a special guest today, I think we're going to get straight into it. Irish boxing icon Katie Taylor is going to walk into the ring for the very last time this weekend, in front of 80,000 at Dublin's Croke Park, an iconic venue for an iconic fighter. Katie has transformed women's boxing forever. She took the sport from small halls to huge stadiums, but it might not have happened were it not for another Irish fighter who went before her, Deirdre Gogarty. Deirdre Gogarty, welcome to The Sports Agents. Thank you so much for coming on. There is so much to talk to you about, and it is an incredible story, yours, and how it has had an impact historically, really, on women's boxing globally as we approach Katie Taylor's final fight. But let's go back to the beginning of your story, and just put into context, especially for our younger listeners, the landscape for women's boxing in Ireland when you were growing up.

**Deirdre Gogarty** (2:40)
Well, it was really unheard of and considered really un-feminine and not things any girl should be interested in. So I was trying to be a normal girl, but deep down inside I had this dream of being a world boxing champion. So it was a very juxtaposition of trying to fit in, but also having this dream that everybody thought was mad and impossible and it will never happen.
But I was determined to, I just want not just a female fighter, I just wanted to be a fighter.

**Gabby** (3:19)
Where did, bearing in mind then, it was not the norm and I'm guessing was never discussed and there was never anybody female that you could see as somebody whose footsteps you wanted to follow in at that stage as a young girl.
Where did this desire to be a fighter come from? What was the switch or the trigger?

**Deirdre Gogarty** (3:40)
Yeah, well, the really turning moment was I was at my aunt's house in Black Rock in Dublin and they were having me watch ballet trying to show me something really feminine I could do, and it'd be great for my posture.
Anyway, thank goodness, my aunt, other aunt came in and she said, let's watch Barry McGuigan fight for the world title. So there I was, which from the ballet to this brilliant fight, and it was such an exciting event. And when McGuigan won and he was announced the world champion, that was the moment I decided I wanted to be a world champion just like him.

**Mark** (4:19)
And of course, as you say, there was nothing in terms of facilities or clubs or anywhere you could go. So your first kind of practice sessions were quite rudimentary in your bedroom, weren't they? The equipment.

**SPEAKER_4** (4:32)
Yes.

**Deirdre Gogarty** (4:33)
Yes. I'd get down, knocked down about seven times in a fight, and I'd come back and win by spectacular knockout every time.

**Mark** (4:45)