Feature I wrote on Andy for the Anglo Celt, local paper in Cavan, a few weeeks ago.
He is a gentleman, very modest and a sound fella. It will eb interesting to see how far he can go.
Modest Murray Boxing Clever
Having captured the Irish lightweight title back in July, Cavan's quietly-spoken champ Andrew Murray, one of the hottest prospects on the pro scene, is gunning for a European title shot.
Paul Fitzpatrick
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PETER MCDONAGH is running his mouth at a press conference on a humdrum Friday morning in Dublin. “I broke his jaw in sparring”, the London-based Galwegian snorts. “Murray is afraid of me”. His manager Mark Roe chips in. “Peter is a powerful puncher”, he warns gravely. A few feet away across the top table, Andy Murray smiles, shakes his head. Welcome to the wacky world of professional boxing.
“I wouldn’t be talking the way he was, that he was going to do this and that,” says Murray of last July's Irish lightweight title bout which the Cavan man won on points to claim his second Irish belt. “I knew what I was going to do but I kept it to myself, I knew I was going to win it comfortably and that’s what happened. He likes to get under your skin, that’s his tactic. He’s a typical cockney fighter, he is all show and tries to get the edge on you but I just kept a cool head and let him talk away. I did my talking in the ring”
Not for Murray, then, the “trash talking” and bluster of pre-fight build ups. The soft-spoken Cavan man approached the McDonagh match, as always, with furrow-browed concentration. His comprehensive points win was just reward for the two months of intensive preparation he had put in.
“It depends on how long the fight is but if it was a ten-rounder I would be happy with eight weeks training. You’re talking twice a day for five days a week, once a day on Sundays and I usually take Saturday off. It would be a case of seven mile runs in the mornings and then sparring, circuits and pad work in the evenings. I usually have to travel to Dublin to get good quality sparring before a big fight as well.”
The incessant slog and the battle to make weight behind the scenes is the aspect of the show that boxing fans often forget amidst the razzmatazz of big fight nights, but the reality is that a boxer's life is a spartan existence. It is said that if making weight for a fight isn't hell then, well, you are boxing in the wrong division.
“I've heard that alright, a lot of people say that and there are not too many boxers who don’t struggle to make the weight, or anyone who is in a sport like judo, or jockeys – they all have to struggle to make weight when they are at the top level,” says Murray, whom RTE's Mick Dowling described as “an obsessive when it comes to training”.
“You just have to work hard in the gym, pound the roads and watch what you’re eating. It takes discipline in your diet and you have to know how your body works. You learn how to do it over the years. It’s not easy but you know what you have to do. You’d hate to go into a fight struggling at the weight, it would show straight away if you have cut corners.”
As the holder of two of Irish straps at present, Murray faces a tricky decision as Boxing Union of Ireland rules state that a fighter may only hold one national belt at a time.
“I’m training away, there is no set date for a fight just yet but I’m hoping mid or late November. I possibly could be defending the Irish title but I’m not too sure yet what’s coming up,” says the Ard na Greine native.
“They’ll ask me what belt I want to defend because I’ll obviously have to give up one so I think I’ll stick with the last one I won, the lightweight (9 st 7). It’s harder to make but I’m a big lightweight and I’m strong at that weight too so it’s not too bad. At light welterweight (10 st) I would consider myself a wee bit small at the weight.”
Murray was an interested observer of British hope Amir Khan's sensational first round KO at the hands of little-known Colombian Breidis Prescott last Saturday night, given that he was offered the chance to get into the ring with the much-hyped Bolton 21-year-old a few weeks before the fight. Team Murray turned down the chance, with the fighter's old amateur coach Brian McKeown claiming that the conditions, and presumably the purse, just weren't right at this time for what he defined as “a career-defining fight”.
“There are no certs in this game, it was only 30 seconds of a fight we saw and you wouldn’t know what would have happened if it had gone a couple of rounds, he was just unlucky to get caught cold and was up against a banger. Who’s to say that Amir Khan wouldn’t have knocked him out in two or three rounds if he hadn’t been chinned in the first?,” says Murray, who turned 26 last week.
“When you’re going to fight Khan or anyone like that, you need proper preparation and I didn’t feel it was the right fight for me just yet. There is no point taking it early in your career and something bad happening because you’d have to start from square one again. It’s back to square one for him too. I don’t know why he took that fight, he lost a small fortune over that I’d say.”
Boxing is booming in this country at present, with the professional scene having been rejuvenated by Meath businessman Brian Peters and the amateurs surfing the crest of a wave, with three medals coming home from Beijing last month. Much has been made of the groundbreaking High Performance programme which produced those three medallists, Darren Sutherland, Kenny Egan and Paddy Barnes, and while McKeown has criticised the programme in the past for producing boxers cloned to the computer scoring system, resulting in a dilution of natural punching power, his protogé feels that the system gave him a good grounding for the pro ranks.
“I know all the lads up there and they are really hard trainers, especially Kenny Egan,” says Murray. “It is a totally different game in the pro's but when you’re boxing at a high level such as in the High Performance Unit, you pick up a lot of experience and it stands to you. If you’re a good boxer you will be well able to adjust to professional boxing. I had my chance and I just wasn’t good enough on the night when I went to the Olympic qualifiers in Croatia, Azerbaijan and Bulgaria. I didn’t fancy hanging around four years because there’s nothing to say you would be Irish champion and even get your chance to qualify, so I went professional.”
Most shrewd observers reckon that Murray, described by one commentator as “a slick box fighter with every shot in the book”, has what it takes to reach European level at least. To get there, he will need to extend his 13-fight unbeaten run and look to improve the quality of the opposition, with Tallaght brawler Oisin Fagan, a former Irish champion who is now based in Oklahoma, being mentioned for his first defence later this year.
“I reckon I would be a few fights away from it [a European title shot] yet, I’d like to pick up a bit more experience so that when it comes to that level, I won’t be just thrown into the deep end, I’ll be ready for it,” claims the father-of-one.
“It could be Fagan next or a couple of tougher fights down the line. He is tough and strong and very, very fit and you would have to be fit yourself to keep him off you. He comes at you and he’s a strong lad, but I'm not getting carried away, I'm taking each one as it comes.”
McKeown, the man who discovered Murray and moulded him into a Four Nations and three-time Irish champion in the vest, plays a huge role in the lives of all his fighters.
“Brian has been there since God knows, the '80's, and every year he is pulling champions out of the club, three or four every year without fail. He is totally dedicated and has put in the time and effort over the years that people don’t see. In any sport, the most successful teams and individuals put in the hours, and they get their reward.”
With his attitude, Murray's ultimate reward won't be long in coming.
DD