{"id":746821,"date":"2026-08-23T04:04:26","date_gmt":"2026-08-23T04:04:26","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/746821\/"},"modified":"2026-08-23T04:04:26","modified_gmt":"2026-08-23T04:04:26","slug":"historic-katie-taylor-fight-will-be-unavailable-to-thousands-of-northern-rte-viewers-the-irish-news","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/746821\/","title":{"rendered":"Historic Katie Taylor fight will be unavailable to thousands of northern RT\u00c9 viewers \u2013 The Irish News"},"content":{"rendered":"

IT will be one of the biggest Irish sporting events of the year \u2013 but RT\u00c9\u2019s free-to-air coverage of Katie Taylor\u2019s farewell fight will be unavailable to thousands of homes in the north.<\/p>\n

The national broadcaster confirmed on Wednesday that it had secured the rights to broadcast the huge Croke Park event in Ireland via RT\u00c92 and RT\u00c9 Player, with 2FM providing live radio commentary.<\/p>\n

However, those rights only cover the 26 counties, as subscription-based streaming platform DAZN have the rights to broadcast the fight worldwide \u2013 including the UK.<\/p>\n

That means the familiar issue of geo-blocking will frustrate many who hoped to watch RT\u00c9\u2019s coverage on September 5, when Irish boxing\u2019s golden girl takes on Flora Pili in an historic undisputed super-lightweight title fight.<\/p>\n

\"Wrong-way<\/a>\"Man<\/a><\/p>\n

While those with an RT\u00c9 aerial will still be able to access television coverage, it will not be available to those with UK IP addresses who access RT\u00c9 via outlets such as Sky, because the UK rights are not available for RT\u00c9 to purchase.<\/p>\n

Most northern residents have default IP addresses that are UK-registered, meaning their access to Irish sporting events \u2013 including GAA – is often restricted.<\/p>\n

Belfast boxers Tyrone McKenna and Paddy Gallagher are among the fighters on the Croke Park undercard, with McKenna taking on Paddy Donovan in the chief support bout and Gallagher continuing his ring comeback against Dubliner Paul Ryan.<\/p>\n

In recent years, several politicians have lobbied the UK and Irish governments to assess unique IP addresses for Northern Ireland residents in a bid to circumvent geo-blocking issues around sports broadcasting.<\/p>\n

Announcing that the Taylor fight would be shown live on RT\u00c9, head of sport Declan McBennett said: \u201cRT\u00c9 was there at the start of Katie\u2019s journey as an amateur and we are delighted to be there for the final chapter.<\/p>\n

\u201cKatie is, and always will be, one of Ireland\u2019s greatest-ever sporting icons and it is fitting that she ends her illustrious career in Croke Park in front of a full stadium and a national audience.\u201d<\/p>\n

A crowd of 80,000 is due to converge upon Croke Park for what promises to be a momentous occasion, after tickets for the fight were snapped up in a matter of hours upon release in June.<\/p>\n

The last time a professional boxing event was staged at the home of the GAA was July 1972, when Muhammed Ali famously took on Detroit heavyweight Al \u2018Blue\u2019 Lewis.<\/p>\n

In footage recently released on her Instagram account, Taylor revealed she would have fought in Croke Park for free.\u201cLook at the life that [boxing] has given me and look at the memories that it\u2019s given me. I just wanted to elevate the sport and pursue my passion and this is what I love to do.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis is what I was born for and I\u2019ve had a chance to headline these iconic arenas and be involved in these iconic fights.<\/p>\n

\u201cJust to open the door for the next generation of female fighters, that to me is everything. I\u2019m just forever grateful.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"IT will be one of the biggest Irish sporting events of the year \u2013 but RT\u00c9\u2019s free-to-air coverage…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":746822,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[41],"tags":[2560,246711,7157,214110,101,56,54,55],"class_list":["post-746821","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-boxing","tag-boxing","tag-chantelle-cameron-v-katie-taylor-2-3arena","tag-dublin","tag-pa2023","tag-sports","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/746821","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=746821"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/746821\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/746822"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=746821"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=746821"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=746821"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}