Katie Taylor has done it all. Well, nearly all.
Olympic gold. Five amateur world titles. Nine major pro belts, including undisputed champion status at two weights. Settling a generational rivalry with fellow great Amanda Serrano and beating every woman she has faced in a professional boxing ring.
For most people, it would be more than enough. But Taylor, at 40, wanted one thing more than anything else before she could contentedly call time on perhaps the greatest female boxing career of them all.
She had long wanted to box at Dublin’s Croke Park, the iconic – and enormous – ancestral home of Irish sport.
Taylor had called for it for years, even while fighting in a variety of other bucket-list boxing venues, from London’s Wembley to New York’s Madison Square Garden, and elsewhere across the UK, US and Ireland.
It might have felt at times as though it would never happen, but it was worth the wait. It will now happen at the best, and most poignant, time of all.
More than 80,000 fans are expected to fill Croke Park as it hosts the final fight of Taylor’s career. She could not have asked for a grander, or more personal, stage for her swansong.
Known as an often-reluctant interviewee, Taylor is perhaps now aware that the spotlight will only shine on her one more time, and as such is making the most of the media rounds. She has always been in high demand, and is now more so than ever, but this time she’s glad of the attention as she traverses Ireland to meet fans and press,
“We are actually on a bus doing a road trip across the country. It’s been crazy,” she tells Boxing News amid a whistlestop tour of the Emerald Isle.
“But this is what I always wanted,” she adds of the Croke Park date. The question of when it would happen, or if it would ever happen at all, has been a constant narrative over the past few years.
“I can’t believe we actually got it over the line. [Promoter] Eddie [Hearn], [trainer] Brian (Peters) and the rest of the team have worked so hard.
“It’s been amazing. It’s been a whirlwind few days, just to see the buzz about the place.
“But I have got a fight to prepare for now. I am looking forward to getting my head down and to start training for the fight.
“I have had doubts along the way. There were times when I didn’t think it [a fight at Croke Park] would happen. So, to get the phone call from Brian saying that all the contracts were signed and it was a done deal, it’s been surreal, I’m delighted.
“I have been envisioning my ringwalk and the crowd. It’s going to be very special – and emotional at the same time.”
It was a case of all or nothing for Taylor. She hasn’t fought since last July, when she closed out her trilogy with Amanda Serrano with a third victory over the Puerto Rican legend.
This time it came without the doubt that surrounded the first two fights in their perhaps unrivalled series. Serrano had pushed her oh-so close twice, but Taylor pulled away in the concluding contest, with one of the best performances of her career securing a definitive victory.
It was rivalry that started and ended at Madison Square Garden. Their first fight was the first time women had headlined MSG. It was perhaps the most important achievement in the life and career of a woman who had arguably broke more ground for the female sport than anyone else.
Taylor only had one dream remaining. If Croke Park couldn’t be delivered, she would have walked away.
“I remember saying to Eddie and Brian after the last fight, it’s either Croke Park or nothing for me,” she says.
“I was ready to hang up the gloves. For me, there was really nothing else to chase after. The only thing for me to achieve was Croke Park.”
Taylor would have been forgiven if she had taken a far safer fight for her farewell outing. But that isn’t the Katie Taylor way.
The 40-year-old will go out against the unbeaten French fighter Flora Pili. The vacant WBO super-lightweight title will be on the line, with Taylor defending her WBC, WBA, and IBF 140lb belts.
The final ring appearance had to be one which came with some semblance of jeopardy, Taylor relays to Boxing News.
“It was very important to me,” she says.
“I had two conditions if I was to fight again: To fight at Croke Park and be involved in a real fight.
“I didn’t just want a walkover. I wanted a challenge; a real risk.
“I have been like that throughout my career. I have always wanted to fight the best.
“To end my career as a three-time undisputed champion – you just can’t get any better than that.
“I could have picked an easy fight, but what’s the point in that?”
As for the looming prospect of a life without boxing, she says: “I am going to miss parts of it, for sure.
“I won’t miss all the media stuff, but I will miss the fighting part. I will miss the training camps.
“But, at the same time, you can’t do this forever.”
After a long, hard career that began she was a 12-year-old pretending to be a boy in order to fight boys – because there were no girls boxing in Ireland at the time – she knows it has to end eventually. Even her body has a limit.
But as one story ends, another is about to begin.
“I’m excited for the next chapter in my life,” says Taylor. “I’m not quite sure what it looks like. I am sure I will be kept busy. I am sure I will stay involved in the sport in some way.
“I am not sure what it will be, but I am definitely looking forward to that chapter. I won’t be like Tyson Fury, going in and out of retirement.”
“Once I have retired from the sport, I will then get a chance to reflect on all that,” Taylor says of her trailblazing career and her myriad accomplishments.
“I am so grateful for all of the opportunities that I have had, even as a kid dreaming of becoming an Olympic champion.
“Over the last ten years, I don’t think I would have had the capacity to dream up all these things – fighting at Madison Square Garden, fighting on the same card as Mike Tyson – it’s like a movie to me. I am super grateful.”
Taylor is almost certainly the most important female boxer of all. Her place in the sport can never be overstated.
But she remains humble: “I feel as though I am standing on the shoulders of giants as well. There have been lots of women who have paved the way,
“I am blessed to have had such a strong impact on the sport that I can inspire the next generation.”
Picking standout moments from a career that has had so many is a difficult task, but a couple in particular resonate for Taylor: “The first Amanda Serrano fight was very special.
“To headline at such an iconic venue, that was such an amazing moment – and an amazing fight as well.
“Even driving into Manhattan that week and seeing my face on the billboards, that was a huge pressure moment. We just had to perform.
“Winning the Olympics as well, because that was a childhood dream. That was incredible.”
Outside of her first fight with Chantelle Cameron, Taylor has always found a way to win.
And she has ridden out more than one moment when a lesser fighter would have crumbled.
There was that desperately hard fight with Delfine Persoon in 2019. Taylor survived the first real scare of her professional career in a fight that just might have changed the perception of many a doubter.
Serrano had even bigger moments in two of their three fights. Badly hurt and looking ready to go, Taylor found something from deep within.
Even against her old rival Natasha Jonas in 2021, Jonas was seemingly in the ascendancy after eight rounds – but Taylor boxed quite beautifully in the ninth round to take away all the Jonas momentum that had been steadily building up.
That part of the Katie Taylor story is often overlooked.
“It’s that will to win,” she says of that underappreciated part of her arsenal. “That relentless determination.”
Taylor has only lost once in her quite astonishing professional career. Only one fighter has found a way to beat her.
It was the long-awaited homecoming in May 2023. Chantelle Cameron was in the opposite corner and delivered a near-perfect performance to inflict that defeat on the local hero.
Almost immediately, revenge was on Taylor’s mind.
“After the Chantelle Cameron loss, I was back in the gym on the Tuesday after the fight,” Taylor says.
“It was probably the longest six months of my life, waiting for that rematch.
“I knew, stepping into that rematch, I was a different fighter. I knew the world would see a different version of me.
“That was a very important victory, a very important fight. That was a must-win fight. That was also a highlight for me, getting that revenge. That was a redemption moment for me.”
That redemption moment came in Dublin, the city which will now host her richly deserved send-off at Croke Park.
It is a chance to go out in style, a chance to leave the sport as an undisputed champion of the world (again).
Flora Pili will have other ideas, of course. The 12-0 former European champion can’t be overlooked. Taylor is highly unlikely to take victory for granted.
We have seen Taylor soak up ringwalks before. The first fights with Cameron and Serrano, where she was absorbing every single second before she climbed through the ropes, were vivid spectacles.
This last call to arms will be extra special.
“Making that final ringwalk will be an emotional moment for me. I think I will have to hold all my emotions together.”
Even when caught up in what will surely be a tsunami of emotions, Taylor knows she still has a job to do before thoughts turn to reflection on what she has achieved and all the incredible memories she has amassed.
“I will obviously have a fight to focus on,” Taylor points out. “But once this fight is over, I will be able to look back on my career with a heart full of gratitude.
“I have dreamed of things as a kid, impossible dreams: To become an Olympic champion, and I did. I dreamt of one day headlining Madison Square Garden, and that came to pass. Meeting and fighting on the same card as Mike Tyson.
“Those sorts of things are just incredible. And to end my career at Croke Park, it’s like a fairytale ending.”
Win, lose, or draw at Croke Park, Taylor has already secured greatness. An unrivalled career that has transformed her side of the sport means history will be extremely kind to her.
History will perhaps remember her best for that first fight with Serrano.
It was billed as the Fight Of The Century in a nod to Ali-Frazier I at the same venue. The tag drew scoffs from some due to such hallowed comparisons, but it was not a hyperbolic description of the event’s place in female boxing history.
The attention afforded the contest also meant it drew the scepticism of a more old-fashioned type of fight fan; one who believes women should not be in a boxing ring at all, and that they deliver an inferior spectacle when they are.
Accordingly, Taylor and Serrano simply had to deliver. And they did.
It felt like a moment in time, because it was.
Taylor showed her greatness that night. Blistering skills and sheer heart and desire got her through when all seemed lost, when her great Puerto Rican rival had her rocking and rolling and on the verge of defeat.
Twenty scintillating minutes later, the course of women’s boxing had changed.
Croke Park, as atmospheric as it will be, is unlikely to witness that kind of drama on September 5.
Taylor will likely leave on a high, without having had to navigate the peril of some of her greatest nights. It will be a night of pure emotion. The tears will undoubtedly flow once the final bell has chimed.
Despite the tears, it will feel like a celebration. And that’s exactly what it will be.
The Big 12 had Texas Tech run through the league last season, with the #2 team (BYU) not on the same level. 
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