(40 years ago last week the world witnessed the most amazing boxing match)

 

I watched a giant on the screen in terror and in awe

The man who’d battered Frazier, Norton and so many more

I was 22 years old in 1974.

 

“Ali’s lost his speed these days. He’ll kill him” they all said

Foreman had the muscle tone, his biceps big as thighs

He had the best of Ali in his power, strength and size

But like a bullock to the slaughter failed to realise

The fight was not just fought with fists but inside Ali’s head.

 

As rounds ticked by we witnessed Foreman’s gross brutality

While Ali floundered covering up; we shared his agony

“Get off the mother-fucking ropes” cried Angelo Dundee.

 

He knew he could no longer float just like a butterfly

The years had robbed his reflexes however hard he’d try

He needed to out-think opponents; that’s the reason why

He’d fought the fight a thousand times but inside his own head.

 

For seven rounds he covered up as on those ropes he leant

Foreman pounded witlessly until his strength was spent

(He later said he’d planned it all – we knew what Ali meant)

 

The outcome seemed inexorable, a cruel and slippery slope

The savage pounding one-way, eliminating Hope

We reckoned, though, without the craft of Ali’s “Rope-a-Dope”

 

So when the tiring giant could no longer hurt or maim

Ali sprang from off the ropes to gain eternal fame

A lightning combination saw Foreman’s wreckage lain

Across the ring; his hopes of victory dead.

 

The world and I were unbelieving, joyous, stupefied

A man had just become a legend, ever glorified.

He called himself “The Greatest”, not least for it was said

He won a fight not with his fists but inside Ali’s head.