KATIE TAYLOR IS a two-weight world champion after outclassing the teak-tough Dominican-born Greek Christina Linardatou to earn a unanimous decision and take the roof off Manchester Arena.
Taylor was deservedly awarded the contest on scores of 96-94 and 97-93 twice, and is the third-ever Irish fighter to win world titles in two weight classes after Steve Collins and Carl Frampton.
The Irish icon was moved to tears such was the raucous noise which greeted her during her post-fight interview with Sky Sports, halted mid-sentence as a mix of Irish and English supporters poured out their guttural acclaim.
She was visibly marked up, too. As expected, this had been no cakewalk: Taylor boxed predominantly off her backfoot and seemed to be briefly rocked by a thunderous Linardatou left hand in the eighth.
Champion ‘Medusa’ fought hard and to some success, but was probably pushing it when she pulled a few faces upon hearing the result; there just wasn’t a case for her winning the contest, and the 96-94 scorecard in Taylor’s favour was about as close as she got in reality.
She already had Taylor’s respect entering the contest and showed the rest of us why on several occasions throughout what was, as she predicted, a cat-and-mouse affair.
The 31-year-old found plenty of joy when Taylor looked to exchange, and dictated the pattern of the fight if not quite the pace of it; Taylor at times diffused the Greek expertly, and even when in perpetual retreat never seemed to cede her grip on the contest.
She was well worth her victory, even if it was more of a ‘job-done’ type of outing than a vintage, blistering Taylor performance that her support base have grown to expect.
The first time on Saturday evening that Manchester felt like Dublin was at about 10-past-nine, when footage of Taylor speaking at Thursday’s press conference was beamed to the 9,000-or-so-strong crowd from the four screens overhanging the awaiting ring.
Moments later, Taylor emerged to ‘Wonderwall’ by Oasis — a bit on the nose, but she doesn’t care enough to choose her own entrance song, and it was worth the acappella chorus which broke out as the challenger paced the ring.
Linardatou, who came out second as the reigning champ, was roundly booed as she stepped through the ropes. She appeared to enjoy it.
It takes a special type of noise to drown out famed legendary MC Michael Buffer, but from ringside, not a single word of his intro for Taylor was audible: no sooner than he had turned in her direction in the blue corner did the roof nearly get sent to the stratosphere.
The opening rounds, however, were a vacuum to that hair-raising sound.
Linardatou began on the frontfoot as she had forewarned, stalking Taylor to all corners of the squared circle and finding skin with three sharp jabs. She nicked an uneventful first, although not before Taylor landed the first blows in anger — a neat one-two combo at the bell which breathed life back into the baying crowd.
Taylor was wary, picking her moments to strike but circling on the backfoot as Linardatou marched forward in search of openings. Taylor took the second — another tame round — with some tidy counters via fleet footwork, but an untidy grapple had already birthed a swelling above her right eye.
Taylor initiated the exchanges to start the third, fighting more assertively while still conceding ground. A Linardatou slip briefly duped the crowd into celebrating a Taylor knockdown, but it was the bull-like Greek who punctuated a tight frame with a thudding overhand right.
The fourth came and went without much in the way of drama, too, but Taylor was conspicuously growing in confidence as she pivoted out of range and made Linardatou look more crude than she is.
The Bray woman opened up at the start of the fifth but while she brought her audience to its feet with a mini-barrage, she ate two big shots — a left and a right — which caused her to err on the side of caution once more. She still did enough to bank the round but Linardatou, as billed, was proving to be a difficult night’s work.
A picturesque three-shot combination by Taylor, the final right hand of which caused a concoction of sweat and spit to fly from Linardatou’s face, was the pick of the action in an otherwise cagey sixth. Linardatou seemed undeterred but simply wasn’t winning enough rounds to be in with a decent shout as we approached the business end.
A verse later, though, and a fight threatened to break out: Taylor, playing to the gallery after a roar of encouragement from the crowd as Linardatou had her mouthpiece reinserted, unloaded and made some noise. She is an addict for such moments, but they can work to her detriment. It was Linardatou who landed the more telling blows during the exchange, a jolting left hook almost beheading Taylor who appeared briefly rattled by it and threw away the round.
The challenger notably played it safer during a ninth in which Taylor’s support were electric, carrying her homeward on choruses of ‘Ole Ole’. Again, she did more than enough to pocket the round, and walked back to trainer Ross Enamait surely cognisant that there was an onslaught coming her way in the 10th and final entry.
In the end, though, it kind of came and went to a degree. Linardatou grew into it but never truly threatened.
The crowd’s reaction at the final bell was loud and assured — they were confident their woman had done the business.
And when Michael Buffer announced that the victor was the fighting pride of Bray, Wicklow, Ireland, the sound may well have reached the town in question.
Taylor’s post-fight interview was lost to the sea of noise, but her tears said enough as she basked in the latest of a litany of career glories.
