No Amount of Pugilistic Excellence Can Uppercut a Hex

While Luke Ayling was still bravely flicking the Vs at Mauricio Lara, hordes of fans were flooding the exits of all four corners of Headingley Stadium. Destined for the bars of Otley Road, they were feeling exactly the same as Ayling.

It was thrilling to watch that moment from the North Stand. A mass exodus of disgruntled supporters does not have the same impact when the ground is half-full for a regular Super League match. A Saturday night fight between a hometown hero and his nemesis gave Headingley the shimmer it has lacked since its facelift, a blow to those who doubt (myself included) whether Eddie Hearn might be able to do the same for rugby league, a sport he often likes to neggingly flirt with.

Josh Warrington was standing in the middle of it all, trying his best to show appreciation and apologies to the 20,000 who had come to adore him, when all he wanted to do was burst into tears. It’s hard to think of a scene more exasperatingly Leeds.

The night was only just getting started. Fans brave enough to queue over an hour for a pint were finally getting to their seats. Even the herds of blokes patiently lining up for an invigorating visit to the gents’ gave up and made for the arena, such is the love for Warrington in these parts. Less than ten minutes later, it was all over.

After being gruesomely knocked out by Lara in an empty Wembley Arena, Warrington could at least feel how much he means to the city during the ring walk. Headingley was set ablaze by Marching On Together and I Predict A Riot, giving the fighter the ‘feeling of a god’. The DAZN camera walking in front of him brought a daunting intimacy to Warrington’s journey, and I’m no longer able to tell if computer games now look like real life or real life now looks like a computer game.

I’m no boxing expert, so I’ll leave the fight itself to those who are. Writing in The Independent, Steve Bunce says Warrington ‘was boxing like a dream’ and already ‘had a man close to defeat’ when the fight was called a technical draw after an accidental head clash left Lara with a brutal cut where his left eyebrow was meant to be. The Guardian’s Donald McRae is more cautious, writing, ‘Lara landed a few hard punches in the opening rounds which had two seasoned fighting men in Tony Bellew and Kid Galahad wincing at ringside… He did not resemble a fighter looking for a way out after a nasty cut. The 23-year-old looked ready to begin serious work.’ We’ll never know which fork in the road the rest of the bout would have taken, which is why the uncertainty of the draw feels so agonising.

Warrington is fuelled by Leeds’ sporting legacy, and has now added his own story into the biggest chapter in the book, the one about head-banging frustration and stunted ambition. He started the year as world champion, still unbeaten, hoping for a golden away day Stateside. Given Hearn suggests Lara’s cut could take six months to heal, Warrington is likely to end 2021 with a warm-up fight before he can take a third shot at the man who left him in February with a fractured jaw, a burst eardrum, concussion and a shoulder requiring surgery.

It’s tempting to move on and write Lara off as the equivalent to Warrington of Garry Monk to Marcelo Bielsa. Those opening two rounds showed there is no gulf in class — after the first round Warrington could not believe this was the same man who had knocked him out — but no amount of pugilistic excellence can uppercut a hex. Yet Warrington knows as well as anybody that success does not come naturally to our heroes in Leeds. Greatness is only achieved in the face of failure, as Ayling could attest ringside, echoed by the icons of the Headingley turf Warrington was standing upon.

“I can’t escape one simple fact,” Warrington told The Guardian before the bout, “I have to win this fight.” So what does he do after being denied the chance by pure misfortune? The answer is in the words he muttered as he was returning to his changing room much earlier than expected. “I have to beat him, I have to.” ◉