Brian Kerr predicted Darren Sutherland, Kenny Egan and Paddy Barnes would win medals in Beijing, while his sporting childhood is littered with boxing memories and stories of his father Frankie’s proud amateur career

I’VE LESS interest in professional boxing than amateur, although I always followed both as a kid. It all goes back to my Dad, Frankie Kerr, a Belfast man who won six Irish titles from 1932 to 1939. He won one at flyweight, four at bantamweight and another at featherweight.

He even won the 1932 Olympic trials but the committee decided, at 16, that he was too young to go. They changed the age to 17 after that so I think he still holds the record as the youngest ever national boxing champion.

He started in the British army then Belfast but his main club, on arrival in Dublin, was Arbour Hill.

Fr McLoughlin, the founder of Arbour Hill boxing club, invited him to come down. We still have the letters at home. He had worked for Dunlop’s in Belfast and was given a job with them on Abbey Street. That was around 1935.

He got a bronze medal at the European championships in Milan in 1937; they minted a special medal for him as “Europe’s most scientific boxer” as he was allegedly robbed of higher honours against Benito Mussolini’s son-in-law. He never talked about it.

Then he went into coaching, first in Trinity College. My early memories are of various boxing clubs around the city, and sometimes further afield, on Sunday mornings. Or the Stadium on Friday nights. Or “The Bosco” gym in Drimnagh.

I remember how the bandaging of the hands was such a solemn event, almost like a religious ceremony. The mixture of silence and tension. It was great preparation for big events that would follow in my life.

I love the sport but was never overly encouraged to participate. My brothers had boxed and I think Frankie recognised how difficult it was for his sons to follow in the long shadow of his achievements. The question was always going to be: “Are you as good as your father?”

I remember listening to fights and being woken up in the middle of the night to watch Cassius Clay against Sonny Liston. Dad was a traditionalist so he was disgusted by Clay’s bravado.

My Dad died in 1968 and missed the completion of the boxing club in Drimnagh that he helped to start. There is a great tradition to the club, Mick Dowling has been down coaching, while Michael Carruth boxed out of there. To have a gold medallist from the Barcelona Olympics was special for the whole community.

I still love the sport and never stay away for too long. I’d meet Billy Walsh here and there, Austin Carruth and Bernard Dunne so I would be aware of what’s going on.

I was at the national finals this year. It was a great night. You can see the potential bubbling ahead of the world championships and the Olympics in London.

That said, I think the Irish boxing association missed a great opportunity after the Beijing success to further promote the sport. They needed to have an event immediately after when they could have filled Croke Park such was the positive wave of enthusiasm. They hammered an American team recently but the Stadium was only half full.

I admire the sports psychology aspect of boxing, how players prepare mentally and the high-performance element. I drop in from time to time and take what I know can be useful for footballers.

I used their psychologist, Felicity Heathcote, up in St Pat’s not long after she returned from Barcelona in 1992. She was ahead of her time.

Boxing is the harshest, loneliest of sports. You have no hiding place, no team-mates. No one can really help you once the bell rings or when you are in trouble. It comes back to your preparation and your courage.

It is the most admirable of sports in many ways. Rowing and cycling are perhaps equally harsh but they don’t have to deal with the spectator element. People demanding that they are entertained. They come to see the big punches. I am jealous of a fighter’s discipline and the humility usually shown at the finish.

It is not evident in most sports but boxing is not most sports.