In March 1995 Irish boxing took off for the first time since Barry McGuigan was world champion, when the durable Steve Collins became the first man to defeat the reigning WBO super middle- weight champion, Chris Eubank.
Collins became a household name with his two successful fights against the enigmatic Eubank and two more against world champion Nigel Benn, capturing public imagination both here and in Britain.
A seasoned fighter, Collins had learned his trade the hard way, when he set up as a professional in the US rather than stay in Ireland or Britain. Before that, the Dubliner had worked as an apprentice electrician at the Guinness brewery, a job his late father had helped get for him.
Although he had started boxing at a young age, Collins had fallen out with the sport in his teenage years and drifted away.
It was after he got married to his now-estranged wife, Gemma, in 1986 that the two made the decision to emigrate to the United States, where Steve began training with the Boston-based Petronelli brothers.
Although he made impressive headway in the ring, he had to take on low-paid jobs. Disappointed with progress in the US, he returned to Ireland and started out again, finally winning the title from Eubank in 1995, famously psyching out his opponent by claiming he had been hypnotised and felt no pain. - Johnny Watterson