By Oli Smith

Heroes and villains. There are those who can do no wrong, those who are buoyed by the chants of their name no matter where they fight. Yet boxing is also full of characters that attempt to walk the tightrope between pantomime villain and downright disliked, in order to change a fight from a show, to an event. This group of fighters can be broken down further into those that do it well and those that don’t. Some of the greatest fighters to have ever laced up gloves revelled in playing the bad guy and they did it well. And others couldn’t quite pull it off. Floyd Mayweather Jr would be the most obvious pantomime villain in boxing today, with a wink, a smile and a knowing nod he raises jeers from the crowd, some pay to take a chance on him losing, others pay to see mastery over the sweet science. Most understand the role he must play to create a spectacle and an event.

Anthony Small promised both of those things in a mandatory defence of his Commonwealth and British titles at the Robin Park Center, Wigan. He delivered neither. Of those people who came to watch him put on a show, it would be hard to believe if anyone went home satisfied. If anyone came to see him lose, again, they were left disappointed.

In the lead up to the fight Anthony Small told the British media that he was among the best fighters in the world, he promised a walk over victory to set himself up for operating at a higher level. After a career best win against Mathew Hall in July it would be hard not to believe that he wouldn’t be fighting at a higher level should tonight have gone to plan. After making his ring walk to Frank Sinatra’s “My Way”, dressed in a tux and pushing himself along on a scooter, Small raised a Tottenham Hotspur scarf (a football team who had earlier in the week beaten Wigan 9-1 in a league match). To say that he hadn’t enamoured himself to the fans would be a gross understatement, watching him chant the score line at the baying mob, was the highlight of the proceedings and most certainly a guilty pleasure.

No-one could accuse Anthony Small’s ring entrances as dull; if he had the go to match the show he would already be flirting World Championships. Thomas McDonagh was Small’s dance partner of choice for his first defence of both belts. At 28 years of age he is just six months older than Small, but had competed in 39 professional fights before the bell rang this evening. Boasting a record of 34-2-3 it is practically a miracle that domestic success has eluded him up to this point. McDonagh is a likable character, quite spoken in interviews and very honest, through the build up to the fight he acted as a polar opposite to Small’s circus act. When informed that his opponent believed himself to be amongst the world’s best, he raised a knowing smile and answered back “No, he is not”.

McDonagh certainly wasn’t a believer in the hype and as the opening bell sounded, he went about showing why. Small started off firing to the body, throwing spearing jabs from well out of range, yet falling short on every attempt. McDonagh seemed to be at a disadvantage by wearing his shorts unbelievably low, in turn giving Small a huge target area to aim at an already lanky frame.

But time and again Small fell short of landing the simplest of shots, McDonagh too took a while to adjust and time his opponent’s advances. Once again the old adage seemed to be holding true; talk is cheap outside of the ring, it is what matters in those 12 rounds that counts. Through the early stanzas Small looked to be throwing his titles away. McDonagh won most of the first six rounds by default as Small showed nothing that could even be considered as an argument for them. Instead he was content to back off well out of range, duck and dive out of the way or laugh in his opponent’s ear when up close. In short he did everything but throw a punch.

To his credit McDonagh didn’t rise to the bait and it was this that kept him just a nose in front going into the last third of the fight. It seems the Small works best when his opponents come straight at him, when his mind games get a reaction and when draws people into his own game. Instead McDonagh showed why he has only been beaten twice in 39 contests; he exposed Small’s weaknesses, only he just wasn’t good enough to exploit them when he did.

He frustrated Small into taking huge looping rights which missed by a mile early in the fight and were ripe for countering. As the rounds wore on it was Small’s extra fitness which saw him through. McDonagh is known for gassing late on and here too it looked like he had given all he had by the end of the tenth. Had he been a better calibre of fighter he could have taken Small all the way to the brink, instead he was always just a fraction of a second behind, glancing blows landed where bombs should have and he took too much in return.

It was a messy, ugly fight and one during which the referee called numerous timeouts to plead with Small to behave himself and McDonagh to stop holding. Small had gained momentum over the latter half of the fight and used it to good effect in the final round; he certainly looked the happier man as the final bell rang out. As messy as it was, and with many rounds difficult to score, most didn’t know what to expect when the final score cards were called out. I had McDonagh up one round, although I concede that he gassed badly in the latter half and didn’t win a round from the eighth onwards. I felt rounds could have been scored his way that may have otherwise been scored even as he came to fight; he took the contest seriously and threw punches whilst his opponent jeered and showboated.

The final scores were read out 115-114, 116-113, 115-114 in favour of Small, who narrowly kept hold of both of his titles. Overall the scores were close enough to accept, the rounds were way open to interpretation. Did Anthony Small win tonight? Possibly. Did he perform like a champion? Absolutely not. Bravado and play acting aside, within four months he has gone from career best to career worst performances. He was open to be read like a book tonight, he fights like a slick fighter, but his shots were so obvious he might just as well have told McDonagh what he was going to throw and when. He pumped his hands the same number of times before throwing shots, time and again he over extended on his punches, dropped his guard hand down and left his chin out to dry over his front foot. These are very basic fundamental mistakes which should be drilled out of fighters by the time they leave the amateur ranks, let alone have two titles round their waist.

Small could be a serious prospect, he obviously has speed, when deployed in the correct way, and a near 70% knock out ratio should do all his talking for him, his record is now an impressive 23-1 (16KO’s). But if he were to carry tonight’s form against anyone operating at World level, let alone the elite, the fight would be uncompetitive to the point of being dangerous.  It is a shame when the highlight of a boxing match is the ring walk, Small has all the tools at his disposal to do away with the gimmicks, whether he watches his performance back and learns from his mistakes remain to be seen.