By Terence Dooley
Paul Smith came of age in October when out-muscling and out-brawling Tony Quigley in their bruising British super-middleweight title fight at Liverpool’s ECHO Arena. Quigley was the reigning champion, he had grabbed the title by hammering Tony Dodson to defeat in the final round of their fight-of-the-year candidate and Tony, like Smith, is a died-in-the-wool Liverpudlian. Fireworks were expected, and predicted by both men, only for the fight, while interesting, to disappoint.
Smith, though, baulked when asked if the fight had been a letdown, claiming that the outcome was all-important to him. “No, I won the British title so a win is all that matters in a fight of that magnitude,” he declared.
“It is not a world title but to me it [the British title] means so much and there was a lot more at stake as it was a local derby, with local pressure and pride at stake – I came out on top and now I’ve got the local bragging rights.”
Smith also confirmed that he had half-expected a tough night’s work. “I trained for twelve hard rounds and that showed in the final rounds. I believe I did the better work in the gym and on the night. I knew it would be hard either way, whether I caught him on the chin or not, so we prepared for a tough fight,” he said.
“Quigley was saying he had done the twelve rounds and I hadn’t, but I’d done them in the gym and knew it would no problem. I knew I’d got it in the tank and that showed. Knowing you can do it and doing it are two different things though.”
Smith was cut early in the contest and there were a lot of clinches, this made for an engrossing, if bitty, battle. Smith accepts that some of the blame must lie on his shoulders.
“Yeah, it [the holding] wasn’t all him,” he admitted. “It was down to me as well, it was one of those were the styles don’t gel and it makes it a really hard fight. I thought deep down that it was going to be a good fight – I wouldn’t have given out a load of pre-fight bullshit about it being a war if I didn’t think it was going to be.
“I didn’t think it was going to be that type of a scrappy fight. I thought it would be more one-sided in my favour but it wasn’t and I have to give him a lot of credit for that. He did some grappling and was strong but a win is a win, and I won’t take anything away from him.”
Still, there is nothing quite like winning a British belt in your own backyard, though Smith believes that he would have been equally fired-up had the contest taken place down south. He said: “If I won the British title down in Dover I wouldn’t have minded, it is all about getting that Lonsdale belt around your waist, but it was good to get it in front of my own crowd and at that particular arena.”
Now, though, for the tricky maiden defence, another local derby to boot, this time against former title holder Tony Dodson. Smith, however, revealed that he plumped for the Dodson fight to shut Tony up and give the expectant Liverpool fans a KO to savour.
“I chose Dodson,” roared Smith. “He’s mouthed off here and there about deserving this and deserving that, he doesn’t deserve anything because he was knocked out by Quigley in his last fight. It doesn’t matter if he was ahead or not but he keeps saying Quigley got lucky. It is not a case of being lucky, you throw your shots and Quigley knocked him out fair and square.
“Quigley didn’t just drop and hurt him when he was tired in the last round, he dropped him earlier in the fight, beat him up for the first two rounds and came back strong to knock him out. I’ve heard all sorts from Dodson – if talking was the aim of the game Dodson would be a world champion and a millionaire, but he’s not. Dodson says I’m only a middleweight but I beat the light-middleweight [in Quigley] who knocked him out.”
Dodson believes that the first shot Quigley floored him with was a borderline blow to the back of the head. Smith laughed this claim off. “He still went down,” said Smith with a shrug.
“Whether it is on the back or the side of the head it still put him down. The side of your head is stronger, if it hit him on the chin it still would have put him down and that is where I’ll be hitting him. Dodson has got no punch resistance left and keeps going on about he’s been in wars and that I’ve not been in wars, well if that is the main factor, and it is a war, I can go to the well and he hasn’t got a well left to go to.”
Quigley-Smith was marked by some pre-fight verbal scuffles, the kind that fighters usually cook up in order to bring out the fans; however, Smith is not one for putting on an act and denied that there had been some stage-management in the verbal jousts with Quigley and Dodson.
“That claim doesn’t bother me in the slightest,” he said. “I’ve never put an act on. People ask me if I was doing it for ticket sales but I don’t play that game. I’m myself in the press conferences and I couldn’t put an act on for people. If he carries on mouthing off then there will be fireworks because I’m not going to let him do that and to tell his lies to himself. He reckons he’ll be bringing all the fans but they were there for Quigley in their fight and for me in my fight with Quigley. I just hope it is a great fight, and he won’t be able to talk too much after the night.”
A British belt brings with it closer scrutiny and Smith accepts that there will be comments made about him on the Boxing forums, although a visitor to these sites the boxer believes that you cannot take the criticism too seriously.
“You’ve got to expect it,” stated Smith. “It goes back to days when people knew who all the champions were. Knowledgeable fans and the public know who the British title holders are and you’ve got to perform as a champion, that is why I’ve picked Dodson, he’ll come to fight and I do well against kids who come to fight.
“You’ve got to shrug them [online comments] off. They used to bother me but about eight years ago I stopped going on them [forums]. Jamie Carragher told me that you’ll end up fighting everyone and it happened to him on a Talk Sport forum, where it all kicked off.
“You do see some people mouthing off and you think, ‘I know you and I know you don’t know anything about boxing’ or you’ve never had a fight, never took a bit of leather to the face, and you sit there and think you can slag fighters off.
“On the other hand there are a lot of knowledgeable people out there, they pay their money for their tickets and have a right to speak up, and those forums are the perfect place to do it. I go on forums myself to see what people are saying about other fighters so you’re going to see a little bit of criticism about yourself and have to take the rough with the smooth.”
One criticism is that Smith has had a long, long build-up in his career thus far, though to be fair his appearance on The Contender TV show placed a lot of expectation on his shoulders.
“How old is Dodson, maybe two years older than me, he’s only one more fight than me and so many wars, some bad, hard fights and bad knockouts,” said Smith when addressing these claims. “I’ve had 29 fights, I’m 27 and I’ve not had those hard fights. Quigley was hard but I’ve not had a fight where I needed to go the place where Macklin and Jamie Moore went. I’ve got plenty in the tank; any marks on my face were caused by head clashes.”
Smith parted company with Billy Graham in the wake of Ricky Hatton’s split with promoter Frank Warren, although hurt by the move Smith believes that he his decision has been vindicated.
“I was badly disappointed when I split with Billy,” he revealed. “We went to Vegas a week after they [Hatton and Warren] split up and I was asking Ricky what the story was, if maybe they’d work something out with Frank. I didn’t want to leave Billy but didn’t want to leave Frank and think it worked out well in the end. I couldn’t ask for more on a personal and business level. Frank’s done right by me and I’ve just signed new contracts with him.
“I had nearly a year out because of Billy Graham and Frank Warren’s problems so, technically, I’m not too far behind other fighters. Darren Barker turned pro before me and he’s only just won his British title. I know he’s had some Commonwealth fights in the meantime but I think Frank’s brought me on right.”
He added: “I’m not a big head and I’m not putting expectations on me. There is talk of me fighting for a world title and I’m trying to play it down, as I don’t want to be saying, ‘I am going to become a world champion and do this and that’. If it comes I’ll take it with both hands and feel I have the beating of [WBO boss Paul] Stieglitz, but I’m taking baby steps, I want to defend this title a few times, see what happens with Brian Magee and maybe fight him for the European title. I’d love to do things the traditional way but if the world title shot comes I certainly won’t say no.
“I’m not looking ahead of this fight. I’ve done that before, I was looking at a middleweight title fight and slipped up against [Steven] Bendall. Although I won the fight in my opinion there shouldn’t have been that doubt. It is all ‘shoulda, woulda, coulda’ and I’m not looking at the past.”
Dodson has his own ideas; the 29-year-old thinks that Smith is there for the taking and that he will reclaim his former title. Paul believes that Dodson is delusional and that these delusions will be shattered on the 12th of March.
“He keeps going on about smashing Carl Froch for two rounds. I think he must be talking about a different fight to the one I’d seen, as I was two rows from ringside and watched him get hammered,” argued Smith.
“In my opinion he spewed it, he went down on his knee and sat out the count. You don’t sit there until ten if you’ve gone down from a body shot; you get onto your feet and go out on your feet. You have a bit of balls and a bit of pride. You can’t call yourself the ‘Warrior’ and sit it out on your knee for ten seconds.”
A world title win brings with it even greater scrutiny, Smith would be subject to almost daily speculation should he join the ranks of British world title holders, for now, though, he is happy to go about his business in relative obscurity.
“I’d rather not be known and have a million quid in the bank,” he revealed. “I want the titles but I also want the money and to pay my mortgage off. Quigley is out the way and Dodson is next. The average fan in Liverpool might not know things have changed and might believe Dodson’s talk that he’s the best in Liverpool - I have to change that.”
The fans will be hoping that Smith-Dodson goes a few rounds and catches fire, as we love our British title battles, Smith is no different. “I watch me mates”, he said when discussing his favourite boxers, “the likes of Macklin, Moore and Ryan Rhodes. It was a pleasure watching them knock shite out off each other but it was terrible that there had to be a loser.
“I watch most of the lads on the British scene but don’t watch too much on the world scene. Watching too much boxing bores me. I’m not an anorak who sits there studying fights. I love watching Cotto but I don’t try to fight like him, I like watching Mayweather but there is no point copying in him, as you couldn’t be him in a month of Sunday’s.
Finally, Smith comes into the ring to the Deacon Blue song Real Gone Kid, eschewing the tuneless dance ‘tunes’ used by most boxers, what was the thinking behind this song, and nickname, choice?
“My dad was in bodybuilding competitions years ago and that was the music he used to use,” he answered. “I was boxing at an amateur match in Canada and had the CD with me and that’s the music they used. It creates a great atmosphere and was a great song at the time. It isn’t massively known but is well known in Liverpool.
“They were asking me for a nickname to put on the poster before the 2002 Commonwealth games and I picked ‘Real Gone Kid’, and it has stuck. It is original; there are around 800 ‘Hitmans’ and 800 ‘Warriors’ but only one ‘Real Gone Kid’. Apparently it means ‘one of the lads’.”
Smith then gave his final take on the Dodson dust-up; he was reluctant to make a bold prediction but believes that the fight speaks for itself. “I won’t put my foot in it so I’ll say it will be a good fight while it lasts,” he said.
“He won’t out-box me, he won’t out-punch me and he won’t beat me. I’m here now 14 weeks out preparing for it and I’ve got the added confidence of being the champion, so the belt is going nowhere. Tony has never won this belt from a champion, he won the vacant British belt against Jamie Hearn, and I’m not Jamie Hearn.”
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