The Scottish Mail on Sunday

Golden gloves Taylor reaches his crossroads

- By Mark Woods

JOSH TAYLOR dreamt of it a thousand times, imagining what it would be like to stand on the top of the podium and hear Flower of Scotland boom around the Hydro Arena with 20,000 friends on hand to share a moment to remember.

When the time came to celebrate his light-welterweig­ht gold at the Commonweal­th Games, reality exceeded expectatio­ns.

‘That was just surreal,’ says the boxer from East Lothian. ‘My whole body went numb. I couldn’t feel it. It didn’t feel real. When I went home and thought about it, I started to cry. I just could not believe I’d done it.’

Two years after his Olympic dreams were shattered when he was the first Briton to be counted out of London, it was a redemption tale to cherish. But, after a week of celebratio­n spent on the sands of Ibiza, the 23-year-old has now reached the fork in the road where he has to choose between staying in the amateur ring or chasing the cash as a paid-up profession­al.

It will be a decision on points rather than a first-round knockout when he sits down to make up his mind.

‘I’m starting to think about it now,’ Taylor reveals. ‘Rio could be a realistic goal. But the way that boxing is changing and qualificat­ion is changing, it’s getting harder and harder.

‘So I don’t know what I’ll choose. The profession­al game is getting harder and harder, too, dealing with managers and promoters.

‘It will be a gut feeling on what will be right for me. I’ll be the one doing the boxing. I’ll be the one in the ring. I’ll do what feels best.’

It might not ever feel better than on the Saturday night in Glasgow where he and Scottish team-mate Charlie Flynn raised the roof in quick succession.

‘I don’t think you can replicate it,’ he says. ‘In profession­al boxing, you might win a title belt but in this, you win things for your country and you hear the national anthem. That’s way up there.’

In decades gone by, when amateurism meant pitching up for training in the gym after a hard day’s graft to pay the bills, accepting the promoter’s shilling was a simple option. Now, the likes of Taylor are able to get by with a little help from Lottery funding and a lot of assistance from the Sheffield-based UK high performanc­e programme.

It has allowed the Scot to go full-time and taken a load off his mind. ‘Before then I was really struggling,’ he admits. ‘My mum and dad were giving me money and they were struggling as well. It was even hard to get to the gym because of the financial problems.

‘But the GB programme helps to make it less stressful. I can just focus on improving as an athlete.’

There, he gets all the support he needs, the physios, the medics, the analysts that form Team Taylor at home and abroad. ‘You get a little reward here for winning a medal,’ he says. ‘There’s an incentive to stay. There’s more options for amateurs to stay there and make a little money as well.’

But if he stays, the bank balance will never keep pace with his new-found celebrity. Which is why the voices are whispering that he should cash in and seek the kind of pay days available only on the other side of the ring.

He would go in with eyes wide open. ‘People say the pro game is good for this and that,’ he says. ‘It’s good for making money but they’re telling me it’s my decision. I’m under contract up to Rio. But I’ll need to decide.’

Soon, he promises. And if the Commonweal­ths were the end of his amateur stint, then he can walk away happy, knowing that he walked out as a winner with his dreams intact.

‘It means the world,’ he adds with a smile. ‘I trained all-out for two years for this. I put my life on hold and just threw everything into boxing.

‘It wasn’t just the Commonweal­th Games. It was the European Championsh­ips, the World Championsh­ips, big boxing events. I’ve put my body through a lot of training and lots of stress. But it’s brilliant now that it’s all paid off.’

 ??  ?? MEDAL MEN: Josh Taylor is flanked by Steven Lavelle (left) and Charlie Flynn
MEDAL MEN: Josh Taylor is flanked by Steven Lavelle (left) and Charlie Flynn

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