5 Live Boxing with Steve Bunce - Ladies Night at Olympia

Episode Date: April 3, 2026

Will Ellie Scotney become the youngest UK boxer in the four-belt era to go undisputed? Who comes out on top as Caroline Dubois and Terri Harper meet in a world title unification? And how will Chantelle Cameron fare over three-minute rounds? Buncey speaks to all the fighters ahead of Sunday’s all-women’s card at Olympia, and sits down with MVP CEO Nakisa Bidarian to discuss his vision for women’s boxing.

This is Five Live Boxing. On Sunday night from 7pm at Olympia, there will be one of the best female boxing cards anywhere, not just in Great Britain, to have ever taken place. On this particular card, four world title fights, five British women involved. Caroline Dubois, Terry Harper, Chantelle Cameron, Ellie Scotney and Emma Dolan.

A special night. a very special night. I'm Steve Bunce and this is Five Live Boxing. So the hectic boxing week continues. We've been all over. We've been at York Court, 7 at night. We've been in Greenwich. We've been inside the NBA with Moses atoll.

It's that type of week. It's that time of time at the moment. And today's a special day, a special day for me because I'm coming back to a gym I first walked into in the early 80s. It's an old church in the Harrow Road in London. And it's a grimy part of London.

Let's not mince our words, and that's where boxing gyms are. And this gym is, well, it's beautiful this gym. It's Mr. Ackai Isola's gym. Akai died in 2020, but his memory lives on. There are pictures of him all over. And in this gym,

Muhammad Ali has been in this gym. Not to train, he'd obviously retire. Evander Holyfield has trained in this gym. Tommy Hearns has been in this gym. Roberta Durand's been in this gym. I was there for all of those appearances. The great Azuma Nelson, and the King of African boxing has sparred in this ring,

a ring I'm standing next to. And it's the start of the MVP week. And it ends, of course, on Sunday at Olympia with five British women in four world title fights. And we're going to hear from some of those women a bit later on. They're having open sessions at the moment. The first of the 20 women to train or show off to about 400, 200 people, is in the ring now.

But I caught up with a man called Nekisa Badarian. He's Jake Paul's partner. They set up MVP, most of the first of. valuable promotions. And I wanted to get an insight and idea of actually what happened and how it happened. And I started off by talking to him. And of course, inevitably, it led to Amanda Serrano. She fought on the undercard, non-televised portion of Jake's first fight that was a matchroom event. They met and she often tells the story. She thought Jake was not a nice guy because he didn't shake her hand. But really, he was sick. And we probably didn't know that he had COVID because he was

very sick that week, right? That was right before COVID. Fast forward to when we set up MVP and we went to Showtime and we said we want the co-main event to be a woman's bout. And Showtime thought we were weird. Boxing was laughing at us. And I just said this in the prior interview. Go back since 2021. Look at every single boxing pay-per-view. Tell me how many of them had a woman as a co-main. I think you'd be hard pressed to find any outside of MVP. I think you're right. So we had that vision. She came in, stole the show. And three weeks later, we said, signed her. She believed in us. She took a risk on us. She was the co-main of our second event, and then she was headlining Madison Square Garden against Katie Taylor. So she's definitely the

anchor of this entire project. The second athlete we signed was Shadasia Green, our first homegrown champion, right? So we've believed in this vision. And last July was really the test case when we went to Madison Square Garden with Netflix. If you look at the branding of that fight, MVPW was already branded there. Wasn't out, wasn't, wasn't, wasn't, wasn't But we were already laying the foundation and now here we are today. And this show at Olympia is a special show for British Box. A special show for you guys, special show for women's boxing. But a big show for, and it needs to be remembered, a big show for British Box in this.

You've got five British women in four world title fights. Quadruple world championship event. Very hard to do, even in women's sports. We did in July 11th last year with a much larger budget than we have for this event. And this event, we're making a massive investment into women's women's boxing and trying to deliver the best of British women's boxing to the public audience. And it seems to me that things are obviously behind the scenes, a bit like a duck looks calm on the top underneath, it's going crazy. But it seems to be like everything's running very smooth

with you guys. I would say nothing is ever smooth. I appreciate that. It's definitely a 24-7 exercise. I get a lot of congratulatory texts from people around the different things we're doing. And my comment is always the same. We're taking a lot of bites. Now it's up to us and the team to chew properly and digest, right? So there's a lot going on. We've been in business for four and a half years, and I'm proud of where we've come, but we have far to go. And you've got, I'm assuming, a lovely list in your pocket of fights that you'd like to make.

If X beats Y, why can fight X? That's the beauty of the women's game. It's a little bit of shape-shifting with regards to the divisions. Shantel Cameron on this particular show, she's up, a stone almost. Do you think there's ever been a women's... championship fight in the UK before with three-minute rounds? No, not with three-minute rounds. There's been a couple of fights for three-minute rounds.

Yes, but not a world championship. That's a first, yeah. So, yeah, kudos to Chantel for stepping up and taking that challenge. You know, one of the fights we like for Chantel in the future is her versus Michaela Mare. But I always say this. We can have the fighters. We can desire to make the fights, but the fighters have to want it and be reasonable in what

that is, right? Because sometimes you may think it's a massive fight, but the economic don't reflect that yet. You have to let it marinate, build and become that. Then it becomes. And final question. I talked about a reference to how smooth in theory you guys are doing it at the moment because it's all going very well. You're getting good fighters. You've got great fights lined up. But the rest of the boxing business is absolutely ridiculous with Zuffer taking on Eddie Hearn and Eddie Hearn taking on this and Frank Warren and Eddie Hearn friends and Eddie Hearn going for Turkey, Alishake. You must be standing back and going to war, boys. You just

get on with your business. I think it's all net positive in terms of bringing attention and engagement to boxing, right? You know, people have said, oh, are you, you know, how do you feel about being in the same pond as Zufa with Sky? I love it because that means Sky is more invested in boxing, right? Whether you agree with what Zufa is or is not, they're putting their time in capital and trying to build boxing. Sky Sports is backing us, it's backing them and building boxing. And DeZone is going all in trying to sign every promoter out there and backing boxing. So those are all good things. The back and forth and the noise, it's engagement.

Yeah, it's engagement. Listen, it's been an absolute pleasure talking to you, Nicky. Thank you for being here, man. No, you're joking. Thank you. Thank you for being here. And celebrate this gym, All-Stars. It's a special place, brother.

Let's go, All-Star, Jim. Special place. Thank you. So that was Nikisa with me in a quiet room here at All-Stars. I'm going to go back downstairs if I can because Caroline Dubois is just about, well, she's just about finished. She's going to come over to me. Caroline, it's here.

We're nearly here just a few hours away from a unique bill with you at the top of it, looking to add another world title. It's like dream stuff, isn't it? No, honestly, it is. And you have to just keep reminding yourself that this is it. This is the moment. It's not going to get any bigger. It's not going to get any smaller.

There's a few quotes that stuck out to me this camp. And I guess one that is famous is there is no tomorrow. And it's true. Focus on today. Focus on where you're at right now, in the moment, in the present. Stay present. When it's fight day, I'm fight. It's a fight day.

Right now, where the open workout, focus 100% on that. I feel cool, calm, collected. I can't wait to fight. Do you feel different? The last, say, 10 days. Is it felt different than previous world-tiled fights, previous big events like the Junior Olympic stuff? Is there something different inside you, Caroline?

No, no, no. The occasion isn't gotten any bigger or it feels any different. The only thing that it feels different is that I feel like I had a phenomenal camp. I feel ready. I feel cool, calm, collected. I feel ready. And that's the feeling that I've been noticing is that I feel so ready.

I'm not even nervous. Like, the work is done. Like, there's nothing more for me to do except turn up and fight, and that's what I intend fully to do. Do you visualize the fights? Do you visualize the outcome? Do you visualize the day, the morning,

walking from the dress room? Do you have to go through that? Yeah, yeah, yeah. I try to visualize the fight. Not too much, because I find that when you're obsessed over it and you get caught in it too much, you can lose yourself a little bit.

And then when you step into the room, and if things don't go in your mind how you visualize it, then you can kind of be like, oh my God, this is not why it's better. So just try and keep an open book, be ready for anything. Whatever she throws, if she wants to come at me for the first few rounds, that's great. She wants to move away, that's great, we're ready. You look to me or you sound to me like you're looking forward to the fight itself. Looking forward to that first belt.

Exactly, exactly that. I'm looking forward to the fight. I just want to get in the ring. I wish we could get in the ring right here right now and fight. That would have been amazing. But, you know, we go out a couple of days, and this is what makes professional boxing more intense because you have a builder. You know, you're days away, and then you get closer,

that can break someone, that can make someone, and I believe it's the making of me. And we shouldn't look past Terry Harper, but there's some good fights on the horizon for you, aren't there? Of course, you know, I always like to set goals for myself. I don't believe it's looking past. I don't believe that you should... If a fire is saying, oh, I was thinking about the year as a whole

and that distracted me, I think that person's a bit ridiculous. Like, we're fighters. You have to set goals. No one walks in, walks through life thinking only of what they want to do today. Like, you think about what you want to do tomorrow. You have plans for yourself. And I have plans for myself.

There's some massive fights on the horizon, some big nights in the horizon. And it all starts come Sunday. And final, final thought. Do you have a message for Terry Harper? Do I have a message for Terry Harper? See you Sunday. So we've heard from Carol. Leislein.

Terry Harpalim, just close your eyes to listen to this, Tell. You've been a pro nine years, six years of world title fights, and you're still only 29 years of age. You're like Peter Pan.

I know. I've got a few more gray hairs now, though. But yeah, it's the start to show. How is it this close to a big fight? Because you've been in some big fights, but this is your biggest fight, isn't it? Yeah, 100%. And it's weird because I'm very calm and relaxed,

and I just... taking it all in my stride. Are you calmer than normal? Very calm, yeah. It's a bit like I'm laid in bed thinking, don't get me wrong, nerves are coming, but I'm thinking I should be more nervous than this,

but I guess it's just the confidence in myself and the camp I've had. Is there part of you that just wants to fight? Just get it on now? Yeah, 100%. Like these weeks ago, they're built to fight and stuff, but for me it's all about Sunday night. It's not really your thing, this sort of stuff, isn't it?

What? Talk. Talk. talking for like 20 minutes to 20 different people. I'm just here to fight and doing my job. I'm just asking this one question. The Caroline shove and push. She seems to be making an awful lot about that.

It was just a little nudge, wasn't it? Yeah, it's not that deep. It was just the elbow interface at the first press conference. I thought I can't like to get away with it twice. So that was Terry Harper there. Now I'm with Ellie Scott and Ellie. Ellie, there's a bit of history. I thought it was just a normal fight.

Turns out you've become. the youngest ever undisputed champion. I thought you meant between us then. We're always history. Yeah, do you know what, Bunce? Just becoming part of that 1% club and becoming undisputed, that's big in itself. You know, the added things that come,

they're the beauty of it, but all that matters is that I win on Sunday, and that's where my mind is. There's also been a lot of stuff with Jake coming and being astonished that you get on like 17 trains and hitchhike a little bit, and there's a rumor that is going to provide you

with a vehicle, but I don't think, because you and I have talked about taking our test together, neither of us drive! You wait two years that you're still using that freedom pass. We might get two for one on the car deal. So what are you going to do? My brother's already ironed it up. You're going, I'm taking it for the lifts, but

you'll get first looking at it. So all jokes aside, Mayeli Flores, you meant to fight her back in November or whatever it was, good just to get it on, good just to get your business done. It's mad, bans. I feel like just getting the fight, it's been a 10, testing itself and like you say those moments where I think is it going to happen isn't it but I always trust in the Lord's time and it couldn't time any better for me and like I say Sunday's getting closer.

And it is a special night isn't it? It holds so much significance and like I say like how it unfolded it's like wow like only God only God So let me just point out that Ellie Scott is good friends with Emma Dolan from when they used to box for England and GB together She holds multiple world titles but what she doesn't have is a driving license. Elliot's been a pleasure talking to you. I appreciate you always, yes. Emma, I'm going to go back in time with you. Okay, I've just been speaking to Ellie Scotany.

She loves you. But as I said to her, I've known you longer. Me and you go back a lot longer than just a few years. We go way back, Steve, don't we? 2012. 2012, yeah. Tell the story. Tell people how you know me.

So I was going to the Olympics to watch Nicola Adams. And I saw you on the train while I thought it was you. I spoke to my mum and that. went over, said hello are you Steve Bontz and met you, met you, had a chat with you and then you just took me under your wings since, haven't you? Listen, I'll take credit for you,

you're fighting for a world title. But you're fighting for a world title, a real world title on a massive bill. It's almost like a dream, isn't it? It's just been years of dedication, dedication and hard work to get to this moment. I mean, it's unbelievable what's happening, but it's

a lot of hard work and a lot of discipline that's got into it. Oh my gosh, see her, you're looking over my shoulder. She's up in the ring. I think she's 44 years of age, but she's a double world champion. You almost got to forget her age because there's obviously something about her. Yeah, I don't think age plays a factor as much in women's boxing. I mean, it's two-minute rounds, you know, and she's very experienced. Once people say about age, all that means to me is she's experienced. So I've used it as a motivator. Last question on Scotany. Will she become undisputed champion on Sunday night?

No doubt. No doubt about it. Put your money on it. You two going out afterwards? She don't drink, though she, but she'll be there. We'll do something. Listen, it's a pleasure to talk to you. And listen, win the world tie. It'll be an absolute delight. I will.

100%. We're bringing it home. Chantelle, we just heard from Emma Dolan, who's starting her world championship career. You're in about the 15th few of your world championship career, aren't you? You're making me feel old there, but yeah, it feels like it. Just to let people know that you nearly did fall over getting out the ring. You nearly landed on top of me there.

I did. It would be very awkward as well if I did that, especially I injured myself. Let's talk seriously. The three minutes, first time a world title fight for women has been contested over three minutes in this country. You're delighted about three minutes or are you delighted about three minutes? Yeah, I've been screaming for three minutes for years and years. I feel like it's going to suit my style way more and I feel like I'm going to get my better work off. I feel like twos I rush everything and I spoil my work where with threes I've got a bit more time to think, look and not just rush everything can look messy. So I think it's the overall distance

or is the extra 60 seconds in each round that makes the difference? Or is it just the extra 10 minutes overall? I think it's the extra minute in the rounds. In the extra minute you can... In a field like in twos, I can get into my opponent. Ding, yeah, and I see him breaking and then the bell goes,

where now I've got a minute to see them dip in and then jump on them. Now, Kalliskov's a big gal. I mean, you know, obviously you're coming up in weight, but that takes away the problems of making weight. And in same fight weeks, Chantelle, I don't take this the wrong way. Sometimes you can be a little bit tricky. You can interrupt. Have we talked about that she is making history as the first ever woman to fight three minute rounds for a world championship in the UK? Has that been mentioned? It has been mentioned and she's delighted about it. She's making history with MVP this

Sunday. That needs to be recognized. History maker. Yeah, MVP got over the line. I've asked it for years and years and finally I've got my wish, so I'm delighted. Chantelle, thank you. And Nikisa, thanks very much. Second appearance. Only athlete to beat Katie Taylor. Never forget that. That's all, man.

Chantel, thanks very much. June and Ricky. Shannon, that was a bit of a workout for a non-workout. I know, it's cold, and it? It's either I've done a few more rounds or you gave me a coat, so... I would have given it to you. Listen, it's nice to be back in front of the cameras.

I had a long time out away from England, so it's nice to be back. You know, when you look back on it, for over five or five years since you beat Ebony Bridges and what was a massive fight for women's boxing. Now you're involved in another massive night of women's boxing. Yeah, listen, my downfall, I have no one else to blame but myself. So it's on me to get back to the competitions.

So to be a part of this massive show, it's just the start of me getting back to the old me, but this time I'm happier and I'm healthy. Is the new me a better fighter than the old me? Would this Shannon Courtney beat the other Shannon Courtney? Yeah, and also this Shannon Courtney, The old Shannon Courtney, we're proud of the woman I am today because I wasn't proud of who I was by then.

You've had some bad years, haven't you, and I'm not trying to be too dark. Yeah, obviously I've had the operations on the leg. I was told I never box again. I wasn't a wheelchair for a long time, and I managed to quite my way back. And then obviously my biggest battle was not in the ring. It was on my own head, and I had a mental health issues

went away for a while because of it, but now I'm back and I'm, like I said, I'm happy and I'm healthy. Can you win a world title again? Absolutely, and I'm going to. Shannon, you look great, kid. Thank you so much, thank you. So that was the new look, Shannon Courtney. When I say new look, Shannon Courtney, if you remember the old Shannon Courtney,

well, this new look Shannon Courtney, you might not recognize. I like her, and she likes herself, and that's always good in a fighter. So we've heard from all five of the British women involved in the important things, okay? Now, there's one man who's massively involved. In fact, he's got fighters in the two main events, or they call it co-main event, but to me, they're both the main events. And, of course, I wouldn't really think about it at first, but how does that work?

If you've got back-to-back women defending world titles and fighting for world titles and you're in a dressing room, what if one of them loses? What if, I don't know, one likes this and one likes that? And that man is Shane McGregan, son of Barry McGregan, but really shouldn't be the son of Barry McGregor. He should be Shane McGregan, trainer of champions. And as I say, he's got Ellie Scotty in an undisputed world championship fight

and he's got Caroline Dubois in a unified world title fight back to back so I tracked him down, went outside, found him and asked him just how it's going to work. We talked about getting afloat but I think, you know, the magnitude of both fights that they would be silly to do a float so there's going to do national anthems which will be about 15 minutes so I'll be out and I won't be able to do post-fight interviews with Ellie but I'll have to come back. So once Ellie finishes, your dash and Josh Pritchard he'll stay back and I work at the corner with Jumbo. So Ian Johnson, who cuts me.

He's got a good eye as well. He's got a good trained eye. And I think, you know, I always rely on Josh Pritchard for just reassurance sometimes and close rounds. And we always mark it negative anyway. But, yeah, so that would be the setup in the corner with for Ellie Scotany. And I love Chris Bull and Smith front row,

my dad front row heckling. So, you know, we can't go wrong with our team. You can't go wrong. I mean, what happened before? Were you a fighter, a Wembley? You had to get to Yule course, something like that. I can't remember exactly what it was. I mean, Scotlandly fighting in Wembley.

That was a title fight as well, wasn't it? It was, I think so, yeah. And then I had to go across, had to get the tube lines across, just like I've done this morning. It's an honest way of work. Travel? Yeah, so, and then I went the whole way through

to Bethel Green. So it was... And did you make it? Was that for Caroline? Caroline was there, and then it was at Wemble? Exactly, so it's not advised. These two keep clashing. At least so with the same promotions now.

That's easy, yeah. So the same country. Yeah, exactly. Which is tricky. Have you had that in the past where there's a chance to say someone would be fighting other scenes like Chris Bill and Smith or Adam, as he? Yeah. I mean, it's always who you've got.

It's broadcasters and promoters there. They like to put you into a predicament. You choose your most established fighter and your most illustrious fighter and where they're going in their career. It's typical boxing. You know, these guys are competing all the time. time to put on the best shows and a trainer like myself gets stuck in the middle of it sometimes and you know that's uh it would be good to sometimes just be a trainer of an outfit so you can never go wrong but you know when you try and hold a bit of independence and try to make try and create a

co-op almost yeah i feel like that's that's it that's everything you know you can't be a trainer of a one promoter you know you've got to got a hold an independence and that's why fighters will come to you and what about an ellie and caroline obviously they know each other in the gym think of it But are they happy being in the same confined space? Because you know what I mean? Yeah, of course. Actually, I think we're going to have two rooms, only because it just gives us that luxury of having a couple of extra,

a bit of space. And obviously, people want their family in and stuff like that. And I don't want anything to cross paths. Or, you know, you don't want to be celebrating, coming back and celebrate and take your gloves off while someone's literally about to come out for a while, so they're going to have independence. You don't want to be coming back having lost.

Exactly. I mean, we don't talk about that. For the purposes of this interview, we are. So that's an all set, because I've seen that as well. I've seen that happen quite famously, and that's not good. Yeah, I had Robbie Davies Jr. And Ellie Scotney back to back once. And Ellie was...

Great friends as well. Yeah, very, very good friends, train the whole way through. Robbie, unfortunately, was on first. And he won, but he scraped through and it was a hard fight. And Ellie was obviously checking how long she had left. And she kept seeing him, you know, getting hit with hard shots. and it was, this is never nice, it's just not a nice thing to witness, you know,

I remember I had, I remember I had Carl Frampton out about to box Leo Santa Cruz in his return. In Vegas? Yeah, and then I think, like, you know, when you're watching it on TV and next thing, you know, Mikey Garcia's absolutely flatlined,

Zatikarnan, who, you know, it was out of the blue knockout. So even though it's not your fighter, it's just happening at the same time. I turn a TV off. Once again, gets to, you know, I pull a plug out, turn the TV off, pull the cameras out as well because they like to chuck cameras in there.

So just a complete nuisance, really. But just anything to sort of offset and make sure, you know, at the same time that you've got to focus in on your job. Everyone knows the repercussions and the consequences of boxing at its worst and obviously at its heights as well. So you've just got to focus in and focusing on the task at hand. Are Ellie and Caroline very different in the hour, 90 minutes before a fire? Very different, different approaches, different warming, warming up techniques and methods.

You know, Ellie, she'll effectively do a whole fight before she goes out. And Caroline's doing five or six combinations, you know, a couple of times and saving it. Ellie's doing 10-2s. Yeah, but, I mean, look, Josh Taylor needed to do that. You know, I've had fighters in the past. I think, you know, you've got the blend of, you've got Adam and Zima likes a good long warm-up. You know, at the end of the spectrum, you got people. like Luke Campbell who'd like to do very little.

Caroline likes to do very little. Get changed and fight. And I think sometimes it's all great until it's not working. And then you say, well, there's a reason where you took three or four rounds to get into the fight. Two minutes.

Yeah, but it's just what they like to do. I mean, I used to love an extensive warm-up, but yeah, not everyone's the same. Shane, listen, thanks very much for your time. I really appreciate that. So that was Shane McGregor, pointed out how easy it's going to be to have those two wins,

in two world title fights back to back. It's simple when you've got the backup staff, you've got the plans, and you've done it before. So that means we've heard from all of the top British women on this unique bill. We've also heard from the Bosser MVP and the man that's made it all possible, Nikisa Baddarian.

But instead of me doing a sort of review of what's happened than a review of where women's boxing is, why don't I speak to a proper expert? You know, I know my women's boxing, I'm not an expert, but Melissa Smith is an expert. She's written a couple of books about women's boxing, including a history of women's boxing, which is not a bad start. Melissa, first of all, you've flown in from Brooklyn for this?

From Brooklyn, absolutely. I could not miss this first card. It was just to have so many incredible women headlining the fight, Caroline Dubois, Terry Harper, who I've loved since COVID summer. Everyone has to love Terry Harper. I mean, she's just the best. and Caroline Dubois is such a beautiful, perfect boxer, and yet has this emotion to really want to be a champion

and to put an indelible mark on the sport, so it makes for a really compelling fight. Ellie Scottney is just pure boxing. And funny. And funny, and just so grounded and so beautiful. And she's fighting to be undisputed. How could I miss that? It's just the best.

So we've had some incredible, in the last, say, 10 years or so. Maybe, no, I think it last 10 years, real solid, great nights of women's boxing, the nights at the garden. And the O2, I mean, the O2, so we've had them. But this is right up there with them. This has got several ingredients that maybe some of those nights lacked in some ways. It's got depth on the card. It's got some real intrigue, and it's got big names. And it's also, I'll put it to you, Melissa, it's the night that women's boxing needed.

Yes, yes, absolutely. And it's a compelling card. fights. Yeah. You've got the first three-minute round fight in Britain. In Britain for a world title, yeah. Exactly for a world title. You get Chantel.

Another compelling story. This is a former undisputed fighter has had really... The Katie Taylor Knights in Dalblu? Yes. Because you missed those. I saw them on television. I wasn't live. I've seen Katie Taylor and Amanda Serrana live in New York.

What nights, eh? Those were amazing ways. But, well, I have to say, for me, the most amazing night. night was the headlining at Madison Square Garden. Now, of course, I'm from... The first one. Yeah. The first one. The first one. With Katie's ridiculous entrance, which took about five minutes.

Exactly. And it was just so slow. It was just like taking it all in. She was breathing in. She told me she would. I did an interview of her the day before. And she said, I'm going to breathe it in. And she did. She stopped and looked at the crowd for 30 seconds. And I got to tell you, 20,000 people in that crowd wasn't a dry eye in the I was crying at ringside. I'll tell you, everybody was in tears. And during the fight, the noise level was so loud. The ref couldn't hear what was going on.

I was wait a minute. So that to me was compelling, in part because as it began, when it was first announced, I was at the press conference with Eddie Hearn, with Jake Paul. There was snickering from the boxing writers there. It was like, dudes. Some of the big New York names. We won't name him, but some of the big New York names are particularly dismissive. And said there's no way it's going to sell out.

It's going to be no atmosphere. It's going to be a stinker of a fight and the rest, yeah. And you had half of Ireland flew over. Yeah, half of Puerto Rico. At least half. Exactly. And that is also something that's very compelling about a New York fight. Yeah.

Is that, you know, like the St. Patty's fights, the fights on, you know, You know, and the garden. And the garden. You know, you're from Brooklyn, so of course it means to you because it's your local thing. But growing up with boxing in the 70s and the 80s, the garden's sacred. It's our holy ground. It's the house of Muhammad Ali. Yeah, of course.

It's Ali Frazier. So to me, you know, from my perspective of studying the sport, 300-year arc, which is also crazy. Because when you think about it, you know, our understanding of boxing began with James Fig, what, 1720? 1720s almost. And women were right there. Yeah, they were. They were fighting each other. Exactly, fighting each other.

And it kind of went up. The shore dishwash or something or whatever. They're names like that, yeah. Exactly. The ass handler, you know. They were hard. They were really hard. They were tough women. And then, you know, when you had the 2012 Olympics here.

Oh. Stay to attention when you say that. Exactly. And you know, you got Nicola Adams who did two gold medals back to back. Picture of her on the wall there. In this team with the man that started it all. Yeah. And she was only the second British fighter to do that.

You know what, Melissa, this might be part one of a very long-running series where you and I get together to talk. It's been an absolute pleasure. I'll see you through the next few days and I'll see you at the press conference tomorrow. Yeah, absolutely. I'll see you at the press comments. I'll see you at the way in. I'll see you at the fire.

Melissa Smith, thank you so much for your time. That's a great way to end now, talking to a boxing historian, a woman who's flown in from New York, Melissa Smith, and her books are available from bookshops, and of course, from wherever you buy your books online. Perfect way to end. Just a little bit of history, just a little bit of sense, because this is a very special night.

Sunday night at Olympia, four world title fights, five British boxers involved live on 5 live from 8pm on. Sunday. I'm Steve Bunce at the All-Stars down the Harrow Road in West London and this is Five Live Boxing.