How Barry McGuigan quietly helped during the Troubles and overcame personal tragedy

A world-champion boxer, a de facto peacemaker during the Troubles, and now a fan favourite on I’m A Celeb...

Barry McGuigan has walked through streets that were engulfed in flames, marched around rings that were coated in as much blood and sweat as the boxer himself, and this week almost flooded a jungle – bringing viewers of I’m A Celebrity... Get Me Out Of Here! to tears, as he emotionally spoke about the death of his daughter.

The theory ahead of this season was that McGuigan has witnessed and partaken in enough disturbing scenes – for enough lifetimes – to be unfazed by his surroundings. Yet a matter of days into the show, McGuigan was overcome. Not by critters or claustrophobia, but by emotion, as he broke down while discussing losing his daughter.

McGuigan, 63, is of a generation and vocation not typically linked with openness, or vulnerability. Yet here he was, perched on the end of a log, heels digging into the soil, an effigy of grief. “I used to go to church a lot,” began the former featherweight champion. “But then after my daughter... I just, you know... I just...”

What ensued in the following minutes looked and sounded like a man hollowing himself: looking and reaching inwardly, snatching at every strand of sorrow and desperation running through his weathered, hunched body. “Danika was poorly when she was young,” said the Irishman. “She had leukaemia [...] They thought she wasn’t going to get better, but she did. She fought back and she won it.” Words spoken proudly – and like a boxer, funnily enough. But as McGuigan recalled the return of his daughter’s disease – a fatal turn five years ago, when Danika was 33 – you might have felt the lump in his throat, as if it occupied your own.

“I feel like such a p***k, you know? No matter what I do, it just all comes back. Those horrible weeks in the hospital, just watching her,” McGuigan continued, his face contorted by pain. He still seems unable to comprehend the unfairness of it all. His campmates were kind; he was clearly appreciative.

It was a captivating moment involving a man who remains a captivating figure, 35 years after his retirement. Not only did the Clones native forge a career of considerable success – “The Clones Cyclone”, they called him, as he won lineal world titles – but while he took apart opponents in the ring, he was surprisingly instrumental in bringing people together outside of it.

During the Troubles in Northern Ireland, McGuigan served as a de facto peacemaker.

“The shadows ran deep,” he told The Guardian in 2011. “And my fights felt a little like sunshine. Both sides would say: ‘Leave the fighting to McGuigan.’ You see, it was also entertainment; people loved to forget the Troubles [for] a while. The fact that I wouldn’t wear green, white and gold, or put on a sign that said, ‘This is who I represent,’ was powerful. It was a very mature and dangerous thing to do. I wouldn’t choose sides. People appreciated that.” He told The Times in 2008: “I remember feeling a responsibility to create a harmonious situation. I wasn’t going to cause any more trouble and strife.”

McGuigan (centre) during his win over Eusebio Pedroza in 1985 (Getty Images)

This was not the only way in which McGuigan straddled a divide. A Catholic, though his faith was understandably tested by his daughter’s death and his brother’s suicide 30 years ago, McGuigan married a Protestant at the height of the Troubles: Sandra Mealiff, his childhood sweetheart.

He represented Northern Ireland at the 1978 Commonwealth Games, Ireland at the 1980 Olympics, and became a UK citizen to fight for the British title – which he won in 1983.

A year earlier, however, McGuigan came face to face with more tragedy. The Clones Cyclone knocked out Young Ali in six rounds, but there was no space for celebration as Ali entered a coma. Within two days, the Nigerian died from a ‘massive’ blood clot. “I really didn’t want to box again, I felt so guilty,” McGuigan later reflected. “It was so hard for me, because it had been me who’d thrown the punch. So, of course, it was my fault.”

When McGuigan became WBA world champion, his triumph was drowned in tears – in a scene reminiscent of his outpouring on TV this week. “I dedicate this fight to the young lad who died when we fought in 1982,” McGuigan wept. In 2011, he told The Independent: “I still think of Young Ali every day, wondering about his wife and child. It had a dramatic effect on me. I really didn’t want to fight on but I did, and in my next fight I honestly pulled my punches. I had the guy in trouble and he was expecting me to finish him off, but instead I hesitated – and he nearly took my head off with a left hook. I realised I had to get the job done, but I cried in the dressing room afterwards.”

A tearful McGuigan is consoled on I’m A Celeb... (ITV)

This week, when he cried in the jungle. Viewers – some familiar with his story, others new to it – got another glimpse at the gentle side of McGuigan. Yet there are figures out there who would point to the other side of the man: past opponents, yes, but also a former protege in Carl Frampton.

Under McGuigan, Frampton won world titles at two weights, establishing himself as an heir to his mentor’s Irish boxing throne. But their working relationship turned sour in 2017, and Frampton sued McGuigan’s Cyclone Promotions over alleged withheld earnings.

The matter was settled out of court in 2020, and Cyclone Promotions passed into liquidation this January. It was a sad end to a period that even saw McGuigan’s son, Shane, coach the now-retired Frampton. Today, Shane stands out as one of the best coaches in the country.

But for any qualms Frampton may still have with Barry, the boxing legend now has more supporters than ever. Maybe the signs point to a trademark McGuigan win on I’m A Celeb... It might just feel cathartic, after so much loss.