By Terence Dooley
[Writer’s note: This interview was conducted prior to the shooting in Moss Side.]
Although he was not born and bred in the Moss Side area of Manchester, former fighter Nigel Travis feels a special affinity with the place after spending over a decade serving it as part of the local firefighting team. Such is Travis’s dedication to the troubled borough that he opened the doors of a boxing gym on the fire station’s grounds in 2008 and has watched it go from strength-to-strength over the following years.
Despite recent attempts by the authorities to move more professionals into the area in order to leaven what can be a combustible mix, Moss Side is still capable of hitting the headlines for the wrong reasons.
The annual Caribbean Carnival, which started life as an impromptu street party in 1972, ended violently in the early hours of Sunday morning after shots were fired and around a dozen people were injured, including a 12-year-old girl. The girl and two men were still being treated on Monday in the aftermath of what police called an “attempted multiple murder”.
The area was once synonymous with the name ‘Gunchester’, and people who have recently moved there believe that the council’s commitment to turning the area around has been mixed at best and negligent at worst yet the feeling in and around Moss Side has changed for the better over the years despite Sunday’s shooting.
The Phil Martin Centre has long been a beacon of hope for the youth and Moss Side Fire Station Boxing Club has also offered an outlet for those who either want to box their way out of trouble or just go somewhere trouble-free of an evening.
Travis is used to running into danger due to his day, night and evening job. However, when he first came to Moss Side he saw a community in need of some inspiration. At a time when many people were happy to run away from the area and its problems, the fireman and part-time actor headed in the opposite direction in a bid to help inspire a change from within.
Travis and two colleagues, Mike Dillon and Curtis McCardle, were given permission to turn an old storage area into a boxing gym. A £2000 grant in 2014 from the then-mayor Sue Cooley along with other grants, gifts and charity nights not only kept the place afloat, they allowed Travis the scope to develop the space and, hopefully, expand it into a teaching and learning zone.
If things go to plan, it will go beyond being a boxing gym and become a place where people who struggle in the school system can add academic subjects to their boxing training as Travis seeks to establish an in-house classroom. Their current standouts are Connor Tudsbury, an ABA winner, and Matthew Knipe, who won a Schools ABA title, and they want to produce more winners.
“We want to expand,” said Travis when speaking to BoxingScene about the work they do and hope to do within the community. “There are two things that I need: space and time—and both of them have their limits. If we can get a bit more of both we can grow this and make it a space where kids can get an education. I’ve been in this game a long-time, running something like this takes a lot of work and, thankfully, some of the local councillors are working-class themselves so they try to help us.”
Travis was a star amateur who left it too late to turn professional. His record of 1-2 (0) does not tell you that he was once the second best amateur in his division in the UK nor does it tell you that he turned over late in the day in order to honour his commitment to his career.
Many boxers scrabble for work or a purpose post-boxing; Travis, however, had the opposite problem, he has been fully committed to the Fire Service since his 20s, and it meant that when boxing didn’t go as planned he was not left bereft and looking for a purpose in life.
“The sins of the father analogy works with me, my dad [former GB coach Kelvyn] used to train boxers out of Cavendish in Hulme, he passed it on to me through that circle of life,” he said when talk turned to when he used to pull on the gloves. “Boxing is at my very core, I grew up in it and can hopefully help a new generation of lives.
“I did turn over too late, but, and I know this is a cliché, it just wasn’t the right time for me. Dean Powell advised me to do it earlier, bless his soul, and a lot of the lads around me did it. They were very good fighters and former amateurs, and we were all wanted to turn professional at the same time. My dad told me not to do it, but I was determined to go pro.
“I told my bosses I wanted to be a professional boxer, you have to let the Fire Service know if you are going to take a second job, but they said ‘No’. There was no real decision to make. I eventually came back to Manchester and went to Oliver’s Gym in Salford to spar Jamie Moore, who was doing good things as a professional. That spar was the start of a beautiful 17-year relationship. It reached the point where I was 34, an old man in boxing terms, and couldn’t box as an amateur anymore. I still wanted to box so I had to turn pro.”
It started brightly for Travis, he registered a decision win over Ryan Rowlinson in June 2007 then was out again within four months, a fourth-round loss to Jez Wilson. Now on the wrong side of a slippery slope, he decided that there was another way that he could make his mark in the sport after losing to Jamie Ambler by a six-round decision in the December.
“I made my debut and should have stopped there to be honest,” he recalled. “People could say I was too old to make a mark as a professional, but I was sparring the likes of Jamie, Martin Murray, and Amir Khan, and doing well against them—it was a great time in my life.
“I was an old man, though, and 35 was a good time for me to retire. I don’t regret a moment of it—I was very happy with my boxing career overall. I genuinely believe I should have turned professional early and felt sour losing to Ambler, but he was massive and I’m blessed enough to still be around the sport. If I had my time again I’d have turned pro at 29 when I first got back to Manchester.”
Despite a lifetime spent in and around boxing, the 45-year-old British Empire Medal recipient’s main professional focus was always the Fire Service, which he credits in part for making him the man he is today.
He said: “I couldn’t have done any of it without the service. My wife and kids are the world to me, my wife is my salvation, but second to them you have the Fire Service—without it I wouldn’t be here doing what I do now.
“It works for me, I can sit here and say that I’ve saved some lives. I’ve had my showbiz moments like carrying people out of burning buildings yet I can put my hand on my heart and say I’ve saved more people through this gym than while out fighting fires. This club is my greatest triumph outside my family and the service.
“I would be a liar if I said that firemen and women don’t have a morbid fascination with fire and danger—that is why we join up. You want to save lives, but, unfortunately, we do sometimes lose people. It isn’t for the lack of trying. Things move so fast you just do the job you are trained to do, and in my case have done for 24-years, and you don’t even think of the dangers while you are doing it.
“We are a service that is universally respected. Some people associate us with the police because we wear a uniform. Then when they need us they realise that while everyone else is running away from a fire we are running towards it to help. This is why we signed up for the job.
“As I said, I wanted to turn professional at 23, but I honoured my profession. Then there was a shortage of firefighters here in Manchester so I transferred up here. When asked where I wanted to go, I asked to go to the busiest station and ended up here in Moss Side and living in Salford.”
When not out trying to save or influence lives, Travis spends some of his rapidly dwindling reserves of time working as an actor in programmes such as Peaky Blinders and via a recurring role in Coronation Street. It started when he was spotted by a photographer in London and lifted off with Peaky Blinders, which is a hugely popular TV show in the UK.
“I was picked for a Derek Jacobi film [Love Is the Devil: Study for a Portrait of Francis Bacon],” he said. “Someone came to take a few photos, they wanted people who looked like they had come second in a fight, a bit bashed up, so my face fitted.
“Then I was asked if I fancied being in a film, and I did. The director told me that I had a great face — the same old bullshit they give to everyone — and asked me if I fancied a few weeks of filming if I auditioned for a role and passed it. That was the start of it.
“Ironically I was in the film [Like It Is] with Stevie Bell, a former pro boxer from Altrincham, and that was about a gay bareknuckle fighter. Stevie got the main role, he was perfect for it (laughs)! I knew him well from England squads, so that was an experience, and I just got into acting.
“I was put up for jobs when I got back to Manchester then got offered a walk on part for Peaky Blinders, kind of like an extra. I had to meet the director, who I had the craic with. He told me that I had a brilliant face and asked if I could do an Irish traveller’s accent. I am familiar with the Irish traveller community so said ‘Yes’ and talked very quickly. I got the part of Erasmus after that.
“They then asked me if I knew any rough looking fellas. Well, I was in a boxing gym so of course I did. I went away, took some photos, and came back with a diverse range of people. They only wanted one person from this gym, an old Irish coach.
“Then I went for a beer with Jamie and our wives. I asked Jamie if he fancied it, he said ‘Why not’. We were both pissed so I sent over a photo. They asked who he was and they asked if he could box. I said he could box—well, a little bit!—and that is how it started.
“Then we were on set with Cillian Murphy and some top, top lads. It was a laugh. Then you’ve got Peaky Blinders on your CV and get more work. Jamie says that I’m always on TV getting bashed up—one time I got filled in by Tracy Barlow—so I’ll be getting bashed up again on TV at some point.”
Travis and Moore are best friends, their families socialise and holiday together and Moore’s thriving gym benefits from the input of the man he affectionately calls “Captain Chaos”. Despite his work in Moss Side, Travis finds enough time to help Moore with the likes of Carl Frampton, Rocky Fielding, Martin Murray, and many more. He also works the corner with Moore or deputises when they have to split the team between two locations. This was the case in April when Travis worked Tommy Coyle's corner for his Commonwealth lightweight title win over Sean Dodd.
Keep an eye out when Frampton boxes Luke Jackson at Belfast’s Windsor Park this weekend and you will see Travis’s windswept face in the corner assisting Moore. If you need further identification, he will be wearing a classic newsboy cap—a look that he copied from this writer. It places a lot of extra work on his plate yet Travis told me that the job he does with Moore bleeds into what he hopes to achieve in Moss Side.
“The kids feel a sense of pride when they see me with Jamie, Carl, Rocky, Martin, and all the lads,” he said. “They know there is a chance they can meet those guys, which is the sugar on top. It gives them a chance to see something in the flesh that they aspire towards. It works for all of us.
“Boxing is an isolating sport, you can be on your own and there isn’t always a lot of love going around, but it is not like that in this gym or when I am with Jamie—we love what we do and all get on. It keeps me busy, which is a good thing, and the more successful you become the busier you are. I like it like that. There are no egos, no big heads, and it is all a team effort that the fans can follow on social media.
“I really hope that the kids in this gym can go on and emulate what people like Carl have done, like getting big fights in Las Vegas. We’ve also had the likes of Rio [Ferdinand] come in. Memorabilia has been sent by Anthony Joshua and all that. We’ve got loads of mates in sport who can help us out. Plus we had one of the greatest of our amateurs in Audley Harrison supporting us. We have it all and want to crack on.”
You can follow the progress of Moss Side Fire Station Boxing Club via their Twitter feed: https://twitter.com/mosssidefirebox?lang=en.
