In just over a month's time, Michael Conlan returns to the ring for his second professional fight when he'll headline at Chicago's UIC Pavillion.
The fight on May 26th arrives just nine weeks after the spectacular event which was the Belfast super-bantamweight's pro debut at The Theater in Madison Square Garden, and a TKO3 over Denver's Tim Ibarra which Conlan would later grade as an 'F' in terms of his own performance.
Speaking on our pugilistic podcast The Irish Boxing Show (full episode available on iTunes or at the bottom of this article), Conlan provided a candid insight into his mindset as he descended the stairs at The Garden to an astounding wall of noise from the 5,000 Irish fans packed in below.
He also explained how having Conor McGregor stood by his side throughout the process perhaps surprisingly had a 'calming' influence on his preparation and stoppage victory, revealed how he wound up meeting a slightly inebriated Niall Horan backstage, and responded to criticism from some corners of the US media who believed Conlan didn't quite justify the hype beneath the spider's web of lights in New York.
Firstly, Conlan elaborated on grading his own performance so harshly in the immediate aftermath of his first pro scrap:
I'm only going off my own performance. I'm not considering that it's my debut or anything else. I didn't perform well - I know I didn't perform well. It was my debut, but I don't care about that. I'm basically being harsh and hard on myself about the performance, which wasn't good.
It was maybe to be expected at the same time, because there was so much pressure and hype around the whole thing. It's hard... It is. I do control it well, but it's hard to get it properly under control, especially with the magnitude of that fight and the number of people that were there, you know?
Some people don't even get that for a world title fight and I had it for my debut. It's just something to get used to. It'll stand me in good stead for the future, I feel.
The first two rounds certainly saw an overkeen Conlan rush his own work, with a few wild swings whistling through the MSG air and drawing the odd raised eyebrow from those ringside. The 25-year-old was conspicuously looking to make a statement, but in attempting to do so had perhaps abandoned some of the traits which made him Ireland's greatest ever male amateur fighter.
Perhaps sensing the element of nerviness to Conlan's works, a particularly vociferous UFC lightweight champion was quick to offer advice to his younger compatriot.
Conlan, it turns out, heard a barking Conor McGregor loud and clear, and revealed that despite his outspoken and frequently obnoxious public persona, a more sincere McGregor made for the ideal dressing room companion on such a landmark night in the two-time Olympian's career:
Yeah, I heard him! He was saying, 'Relax, let it come, get behind the jab' and stuff. It was great to have him there. He knows sport, you know? He knows boxing. He watches boxing, and you don't need to be a boxer to know boxing. He was shouting in good advice at times, telling me not to force it. He was very, very vocal from ringside and he was close to the ring, so I could hear him. But, you know, it wasn't his voice I was focusing on, it was Manny [Robles]' and Matthew [Macklin]'s in my corner.
It was definitely great to have [Conor] there. He was a help before the fight, he had a calming sense about him. He was telling me to be calm in the chaos, using the fancy words and stuff! But it was simple what he was saying. Stay calm, relax, let it all flow. And that is the main thing when you're in those situations - you're just too tight, like I was in the first round, swinging for the fences.
Conor's best words were just to remain calm and relax, just like you're in the gym. And that's what you need to do in those situations, just change it up and flip your mindset from being in a huge fight situation to just being in the gym.
Of course, McGregor is no stranger to criticism; he generally both evokes and revels in it in equal measure. Incidentally, the MMA star's coach John Kavanagh - a long-time admirer and friend of Conlan's - launched a passionate defence of the Falls Road man when his debut was scrutinised by leading combat sports writer Kevin Iole.
The Yahoo Sport journalist - who covers both MMA and boxing - ascertained in his Patrick's weekend column that Conlan's US arrival was 'the biggest push in the US any Olympian has gotten since Oscar De La Hoya in 1992', adding to his lukewarm assessment of the Irishman's pro debut on Twitter.
My honest take: OK performance, but certainly not like watching a @FloydMayweather debut when you knew he'd be a big star.
— Kevin Iole (@KevinI) March 18, 2017
Conlan had nothing coming back at him. Wouldn't expect him to fight a star in his debut, but I suggest tempering expectations
— Kevin Iole (@KevinI) March 18, 2017
Conlan's own response to the mild criticism from Iole and others is one of a fighter more than comfortable with his unprecedented platform.
Let them talk, he says. And let him fight.
It comes with the territory. If I was going to be a nobody, or somebody who's going to be fighting at the tail-end of cards or the start of cards - and not many people are going to see me - then I'm not going to get much criticism, am I?
So I feel that the fact that I will be a main event, and be a big name in boxing, criticism is going to come, and I may as well just get used to it early. That's the way I'm looking at it at the minute. And that was one thing McGregor said to me before - and not just now, he said this to me a long time ago. He said: 'Look, people are going to talk shit about you, so just don't read it. Let them talk shit, and don't rise to it. It doesn't matter what they say, it matters what you do.'
And it's true. Let them have their criticism, let them say what they want to say, because at the end of the day it's me doing what I do. And their opinions do not matter.
McGregor, of course, wasn't the only Irish sporting ambassador in MSG's Theater for Conlan's debut. Niall Horan and the Mullingar massive sat behind press row, shamrock suit-clad for the weekend that was in it, with Horan particularly vocal in his support of Conlan, and indeed the Irish dancers who preceded the Belfast man in the ring.
He and Conlan met backstage for a picture prior to the fight, but Conlan admitted with a chuckle that conversation between the pair was sparse for obvious reasons:
It was great. Manny [Robles] was more excited than me, because his daughters wanted to see Niall, so he got a picture and sent it to his daughters.
He was a sound fella, but he was on the juice so I wasn't really able to have too much conversation with him! It was more in and out, I got a picture with him and went back to my changing room.
As for the future, Conlan returns in Chicago on May 26th before travelling to Australia to fight on Top Rank stablemate Manny Pacquiao's undercard on July 2nd.
He enters both having already experienced a taste of what most fighters strive for their entire careers to achieve - a packed house of thousands of fans, and a caldron-like atmosphere in their honour. Conlan won't take it for granted, but when it happens again - and even on a larger scale - he feels he'll be more than accustomed to such pressures.
If I could like...capture...that moment of walking down, however long it was - five or six minutes - walking to the ring, and put it in a cup and drink it every day, that's what I would do. It was really special. As soon as the doors opened and I was standing at the top of the stairs, it was just like...'Woah'.
I didn't even feel nervous. I felt comfortable, if I'm honest. I felt nervous before, but once the doors opened I was thinking, this is unbelievable. I was just like, 'I'm home'. That's what I felt like. I felt like I was at home.
There's a reason why Top Rank have The Theater at Madison Square Garden booked out for the next five St. Patrick's weekends, although there remains a sense that they'll be required to upgrade to the 21,000-capacity Garden Arena before even half of those reservations are fulfilled.
You can listen to Michael Conlan's full interview on The Irish Boxing Show on iTunes or your other podcast providers, and the full episode is also available to listen to below.
