OVER five years have passed since injury forced Ryan Burnett to hang up his gloves. The North Belfast man was just days out from his 27th birthday in May 2019 when he stopped Jelbirt Gomera at the Ulster Hall to improve to 20-1, but it would prove to be his last dance.
It all stemmed from his previous fight in the quarter-final of the 2018 World Boxing Super Series in Glasgow when facing Nonito Donaire, he tore muscle fibres in his right internal oblique which saw him taste defeat in the cruellest fashion.
Prior to that, he was on top of the world having unified the bantamweight division with victories over Lee Haskins and Zhanat Zhakiyanov for the IBF and WBA titles that catapulted him into the conversation for Ireland's best ever.
However, life had the plans and for the past five years, Burnett has been running his own gym in Antrim with The Boxing Academy a hive of activity.
Still, the sport remained in the blood and although his fighting days are long behind him, the lure of getting back in the game proved too great to ignore, so now he is back with the pads replacing the gloves as coach to Conor Quinn, James Freeman and Charles McDonagh.
"I was missing the game, not fighting, but missing the nights and being involved," said Burnett.
"I'd been asked for years by fighters to coach them and I never have but lately I have been training pros and enjoying it, so that feeling of being back involved again got me thinking. After a few weeks of thinking and having trained some lads, I thought I may as well as I have been enjoying in.
"I've two lads with one who has two fights (Freeman) and the other (McDonagh) hasn't made his debut yet, so it will be easy enough to mould those two.
"With Conor, I see serious potential as he is good at listening and I'm excited to see where it goes with him."
Ryan Burnett with his fighters (L-R) Conor Quinn, James Freeman and Charles McDonagh
Quinn is a little further down the road than his new gym-mates but is coming off a crushing loss to Conner Kelsall in a Commonwealth flyweight title fight at the SSE Arena in June, which has ultimately resulted in him moving to Burnett from former coach Dee Walsh.
'The Magnificent' remains a good prospect with plenty of talent to nurture and Burnett is confident the former Clonard amateur will bounce back from this setback in fine style.
"I watched the fight back and figured out what he was doing wrong," he confirmed.
"After explaining it to him and showing him a few things, he said he could understand, so he seems very coachable, which is great. What I'm telling him to do, he is doing in sparring already. I've only been working with him for a few weeks and things are gelling, so I do expect him to come back seriously strong."
Burnett may have just turned to coaching professional fighters, but he is coming off a career where he reached the very top, coached by Adam Booth for the majority after an initial spell with Ricky Hatton.
He absorbed the knowledge that was being delivered by men who operated at the very top of the fight game and feels he is well placed to pass that onto the next generation.
"I worked with the best coaches in the world and the thing with me, I was always asking 'why should I move this way?' or 'why should I do this?', so over the years I gained that knowledge," he explained.
"It wasn't to be a coach, but to be a better fighter for myself and within that time, I learnt how to fight clever and have a deep understanding of what I was doing. All I am doing now is passing on that information to the other lads.
"My gym is fully-booked every day, so I'm always swamped with people wanting to train. Now I've taken these pros on, I am able to adjust my time better to suit me, which gives me more enjoyment."
