Katie Taylor has said the last fight of her professional career in front of a home crowd will be a “dream come true”.
The details of the sporting spectacle were confirmed during an emotional press conference at the headquarters of the Gaelic games, Croke Park – which Taylor called the “cathedral of Irish sport”.
Taylor, 39, is to take on 28-year-old Frenchwoman Flora Pili on September 5th in the stadium that has a capacity of more than 80,000.
Taylor said she had “goosebumps” at the thought of fighting in the “iconic” Dublin stadium and hearing the roars of “ole, ole, ole” from the home crowd.
The Bray native also has the chance to finish her career with all boxing titles back in in her grasp.
“This was really an impossible dream a few years ago, and here we are. This is going to be the most iconic moment of my whole career,” she said.
She said that she went to Croke Park as a child to see all-Ireland final clashes and saw Bruce Springsteen perform in 2024, and that it would be “amazing” to be the athlete in the stadium in a few months.
She said she wanted a “real challenge” for her last fight and Pili would be a “dangerous opponent”, with Pili raising her eyebrows at the compliment as it was translated to her.
Taylor’s manager, Brian Peters, got emotional speaking about the first time he, Taylor and her mother Bridget went to sports promoter Eddie Hearn’s offices 10 years ago.
He said: “We went into that day, Eddie, I don’t think we really had a plan. We didn’t know where we were going, we didn’t know how we’re going to do it, and after Katie spoke to you, just with the conviction that she showed, I think you believed we had something very special.”
Hearn paid tribute to Taylor’s tenacity and commitment to push boundaries in women’s boxing, adding that he would be “astonished” if there was a dry eye in Croke Park come September.
“The support that we have had and the momentum that we have had from the people of Ireland is what has made this happen,” he said, billing it as a special day in Irish sporting history.
Clinching Croke Park as the venue of the sporting spectacle was said to be “not easy” by both Mr Peters and Mr Hearn, but the stadium’s commercial director, Peter McKenna, paid tribute to Taylor as “without doubt the greatest Irish sportsperson of all time”.
“We’re mighty proud that we have this fight in Croke Park, it’s going to be fantastic,” he said.
“It’s great that everything was able to come together, we were hoping that the stars would align, the stars have aligned.
“I do think it’s going to be one of the great big historic events that have been held in Croke Park.”
Tickets go on general sale on Friday.
