THE BALLAD OF JOHNNY OWEN: A Novel

My name is Hugh Morley, I'm a sports journalist, lucky enough to have been blessed to call Johnny Owen my friend. Johnny was born John Richard Owen on Saturday 7th January 1956 at Gwaunfarren Maternity hospital in Merthyr Tydfil, South Wales. The following is the story of the last days of his young life.

It is five thousand miles between Merthyr Tydfil and Mexico City. In so many ways a world apart, but one thing they do share is an unerring ability to produce great fighters. On the occasions they clash, sometimes, they're simply too brave. An utter refusal to accept defeat means their hearts take them to places mere mortals should never go. Many for showing such bravery are forced to pay the ultimate price. Carried out of the ring on their shield. Or a stretcher. Johnny Owen was such a man.

Whilst the Mexican world champion Lupe Pintor was a ferocious fighter who lived life in the fast lane, Johnny was a simple soul, living only for boxing. His skeletal features and emaciated frame made him a most unlikely looking pugilist, but this he truly was. In September 1980, when the chance came to fight Pintor in downtown Los Angeles, at the Olympic Auditorium, a Mexican bearpit, for the world title he grasped it. Tragically, the bout ended with him knocked out late on, made unconscious and placed into a coma from which he would never wake.

Many years later, Johnny's dad Dick Owen, travelled to Mexico City with a BBC Wales film crew to seek out Pintor who remained haunted by Johnny's death at his hands. The two broke bread, became friends, and Pintor accepted Dick's offer to go to Merthyr and unveil a statue in Johnny's honour. This, then, the following wrote in a veil of tears is the Ballad of Johnny Owen.