Female fighters to make boxing history at Madison Square Garden

At the end of April, boxing history will be made. For the first time, two female fighters, Katie Taylor and Amanda Serrano, will face off at New York’s legendary venue Madison Square Garden, in a fight that is predicted to supercharge the sport’s rapid rise in popularity.

For two women to go 10 rounds at the same venue where Muhammad Ali fought Joe Frazier – twice – and Rocky Marciano knocked out an ageing Joe Louis shows the remarkable, rapid progress that has taken place in the past two decades.

It was watching women win Olympic medals using the same blend of toughness and elan as their male counterparts, some claim, while the success of the 2004 film Million Dollar Baby gave the grit and determination of female boxers the Hollywood treatment.

Whatever the reason, it is worth rememberingthe UK’s first legal women’s fight took place 23 years ago, and female boxers still experience stigma and stereotyping in male-dominated clubs.

Taylor and Serrano’s fight represents a sea change: it has generated interest on a level with male fights, with pre-sale tickets for the 20,000-capacity arena selling out quickly.

Women’s boxing is becoming more popular at all levels, from amateur to professional. According to a Sport England survey from 2020, 17% more women boxed regularly in 2020 than in 2015, with 420,400 women involved, while Boxing England said there has been a 65% growth in female membership since 2017, despite the pandemic.

When Taylor, an Irish boxer with a UK team, began her career as a teenager in the late 1990s, she had to pretend to be a boy under the pseudonym Kay.

“When I started, women’s boxing wasn’t allowed in Ireland. That was a huge barrier I had to break down. One of the best things about my journey is