Matchroom promoter Eddie Hearn has revealed his plans for Katie Taylor’s homecoming fight in Ireland, as he prepares to negotiate a rematch with Amanda Serrano in yet another historic night for women’s boxing.
Taylor and Serrano have already shared this ring, with Taylor achieving a career-best split-decision win in one of the fights of the year at Madison Square Garden. Despite the win being fair, such high levels of boxing demand a rematch.
This time, Taylor wants the fight to be made on home soil, where thousands of her vocal supporters can cheer her name whilst she’s at peak ability.
The standout venue for this would be Croke Park, however Hearn told iFL TV that he may need some support in securing the expensive venue.
“Obviously, our focus is on Amanda Serrano, but she has also been ordered to fight Erika Cruz, our other world champion, at featherweight for the undisputed [title]. So everything is a bit up in the air. Our focus is a million percent on going to Croke Park, we do need their support and we need the Irish government’s support as well.
Not in terms of allowing it to happen, but this is a very expensive operation to go into Croke Park and put a fight on, because we have other opportunities in Ireland, with different stadiums. For me, Croke Park is the one, it’s historic. We can go to the rugby stadium, we can go to other places, but for me, even as a promoter and I know how Katie feels, this is where it should happen.
There’s been a lot of conversations, really going back from last year. It’s an expensive place, very expensive and we believe we fill it, but we’ve got to make it right numbers wise for Katie, for Amanda and hopefully we will be there.”
A clearly excited Hearn went one step further and spoke of his idea on what might come before the main event – 50/50 fights with some local rising stars.
“You can’t look at social media at the moment without Irish fighters saying ‘I’ll fight him and I’ll fight him’ and I sent Brian Peters a list the other day of fights, it’s so easy to do isn’t it and I’ll tell you now:
Gary Cully vs Jorge Linares
Spike O’Sullivan vs Dennis Hogan or Caoimhin Agyarko
Luke Keeler vs Jason Quigley
Thomas Carty vs Johnny Fisher
There’s so many fights like that going down and you can imagine what kind of night it will be. There are so many people, Irish fighters, desperate to get on this fight, genuinely you could just say that the only way, like UFC style, is if it’s ‘you vs you, I’m not talking to you anymore, I’ll see you there, do you want it or not?'”
Finally, Hearn confirmed that he expects the fight – should the opponent be Serrano – to take place in the first half of 2023.
“[The fight will take place] April/May, it will be Katie Taylor’s next fight, with Serrano we’ve got to talk about Serrano and ask if she wants to go straight into that or if she wants to fight [Erika] Cruz first. If she fights Cruz that will be in January and again that’s a difficult fight, but this is a must for us and to deliver it for Katie.”
Undisputed champion Katie Taylor has a lot to live up to if she wishes 2023 to be as successful as this year was, but a win in front of her home faithful would surely be one of the best of a legendary career, allowing Ireland to stops and appreciates one if it’s greatest ever sporting heroes.