There’s an ad’ doing the radio rounds at the moment wherein ‘Big’ Ben Dunne goes back to his bread and butter, declaring of some new business venture or other that “Ben Dunne’s better value beats them all.”
His much smaller namesake has always given his best pound-for-pound, but Bernard Dunne should now hang up his gloves while he still can.
The likeable Dubliner lasted about as long as it takes to spell his opponent Poonsawat Kratingdaenggym’s name at the O2 on Saturday night, mercifully counted out on the three knockdown rule following a succession of jawbreakers from the mandatory super-bantamweight challenger.
Timing is essential in all sports and not for the first time Marty Morrissey’s microphone intervention was about as opportune as another left hook from the Thai pocket rocket.
Dunne, still clearly dazed, should never have been put in a position to entertain questions so soon after being scraped off the floor, blood oozing from several orifices, including, most worryingly, his ear.
Whether it was Morrissey’s or an RTÉ producer’s call, it was terrible taste, I thought. As was the nauseating sound of Marty telling the 29-year-old that he was still ‘the best’ contrary to the evidence of everyone’s eyes, not least those glassy ones belonging to the former champion.
I don’t know which was more unsettling: watching Dunne’s violent demise, or Darren Sutherland’s devastated dad desperately seeking answers on the ‘Late Late Show’ the previous night.
Dunne, whose WBA title triumph last time out was a triumph for will over won’t, said in his emotional post-fight state that all he wanted to do was give Irish boxing “a bit of joy” after Sutherland’s suicide. “I’ll be back,” he vowed.
Noble sentiments, simultaneously selfless and selfish. The last thing Irish boxing needs is another tragedy.
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