The ragamuffin who took everything from Donald Curry

On paper, the two records were almost identical. Donald Curry, from Fort Worth, was 25–0. Lloyd Honeyghan, from London, was 27–0. In every other way the fight at Caesars in Atlantic City looked like a mismatch. Curry held the WBA, WBC and IBF welterweight titles. Only four of his opponents had heard the final bell. Honeyghan held British, Commonwealth and European titles and was barely known in America.

Curry did not pretend to take him seriously. He called Honeyghan a "ragamuffin". Honeyghan's manager, Mickey Duff, responded in the most practical way available: he put $5,000 on his fighter at 7–1.

There were signs, for anyone looking, that the favourite was not what he had been. Curry had fought only four rounds in the previous year, and he was struggling to make the 147lb welterweight limit. His promoter, Bob Arum, said: "He looked emaciated. He had no zip, no nothing."

The second round

Honeyghan did not wait to find out whether Curry was diminished. From the first bell he threw more punches, and more combinations, while Curry probed with his jab. In the second round Honeyghan landed a straight right that buckled Curry, whose knee almost touched the canvas.

To his credit, Curry came back. The third and fourth were his best rounds. He landed a right hand that hurt Honeyghan, and for a spell the fight looked like it might turn into the one everyone had expected.

It did not last. In the fifth Honeyghan wobbled Curry with an overhand right and kept landing one-twos as Curry backed away. In the sixth the two men clashed heads, and a gash opened over Curry's left eye. Honeyghan finished the round with a burst of unanswered punches.

Retirement on the stool

Between the sixth and seventh rounds the ringside doctor examined the cut, and Curry did not come out. Honeyghan was undisputed welterweight champion of the world. The Ring and KO magazine both named it the upset of the year, and Boxing News has since ranked it the fifth biggest upset in boxing history.

Honeyghan did not keep all of it for long, and that was his choice. In January 1987 he gave up the WBA belt in protest at the organisation's dealings with apartheid South Africa.

It is easy to explain the result through Curry's weight problems, and they were real. But Honeyghan still had to see the opening and take it. He went at the best welterweight in the world from the first bell, and when he was hurt in the third he kept coming. Duff collected his winnings.