George Kimball America At LargeHe was back in Oklahoma when he learned that Peter McDonagh, his scheduled opponent on this Saturday night's boxing card at the National Stadium, had withdrawn, citing a knee injury, and Oisín Fagan asked, quite sensibly, "Why didn't he just get Uri Geller to fix it?"

The Israel psychic had allegedly been McDonagh's "secret weapon" in the run-up to January's somewhat odoriferous Irish lightweight title fight against Michael Gomez. In that one, you will recall, Gomez, a heavy betting favourite, had handled his seemingly inferior opponent with ease, only to abruptly quit in the fifth round, resulting in an investigation by the Boxing Union of Ireland into a suspected betting coup.

The probe cleared both participants, though its conclusions were not kind when it came to Gomez's bravery. As far as we know, Uri Geller was not investigated, but he has since terminated his association with boxing and gone back to spoon-bending.

McDonagh was supposed to make his first defence against the Portmarnock-reared, Oklahoma-based Fagan, who had made his own impression on the Irish boxing audience with a crowd-pleasing first-round knockout of Richie Scifo on Brian Peters' card at the National Stadium last October.

Although he's been boxing for barely three years, Fagan has carved out a 15-3 professional record and returns to Ireland as the Oklahoma state lightweight champion, a title only slightly more significant than the International Boxing Organisation championship Bernard Dunne will defend against David Martinez in Saturday's main event.

Several years ago Fagan was a midfielder for the Portmarnock senior team, and enjoyed a particularly good game coinciding with a visit from a soccer coach representing Chicago's Lewis University. Invited to America for an official recruiting visit, he was ultimately offered a scholarship that would have covered nine-tenths of his tuition, room and board.

"But that still would have left $5,000 a year to pay, and I couldn't afford that," said Fagan, who politely declined.

The Chicago coach had been so certain he would land the Dubliner that he had posted his statistics on the school's soccer web page. The information lay kicking around in cyberspace for a couple of years before it was unearthed by Jimmy Hampton, the soccer coach at the University of Arts and Science of Oklahoma, who sought out Fagan.

Offered a full scholarship, Fagan cast his lot with the Drovers, and spent several years in Chickasha, pursuing his degree at UASO. Then, upon graduating, he found he had no job, no work permit, and no obvious means of getting back to Ireland.

During the Midwestern winters he had stayed in shape at a local gymnasium operated by the infamous Buck Smith, an Oklahoma pug who had nearly 200 professional fights, beating all-comers on the Oklahoma-Kansas-Missouri circuit and losing nearly every time he ventured outside that comfort zone.

Smith offered Fagan a chance to earn $200 fighting a four-rounder at the AMC Flea Market in Oklahoma City in February, 2003.

Since Oisín at this point had exactly $21 in the bank he jumped at the chance, and to his surprise scored a fourth-round TKO over Sheldon Mosely in his professional debut.

Fagan wasn't looking at this as the beginning of a career. By his reckoning, another one of these adventures might earn him the price of a passage back to Dublin. So a few months later he was back in the ring again, and this time knocked out Jason Varnell in the first round at the Farmers' Market in Oklahoma City.

Seated in the audience that night was Phil Cunningham, the principal at Columbus Elementary School. Impressed by Fagan's victory, he chatted with him afterwards. During the course of the conversation it developed that Cunningham had a vacancy for a Physical Education teacher. Oisíinterviewed for the job a few days later, and has been gainfully employed since.

Having a day job didn't lead him to abandon his avocation, but it has meant he's shown up for work with a black eye or a stitched-up face a time or two.

Oklahoma isn't exactly a boxing hotbed, as best illustrated by the fact nearly half of Fagan's 15 wins have come against three boxers: he's fought Mosely, against whom he broke his maiden, three times, and Donald Cairns and Steve Mincks twice apiece.

His biggest moment in the limelight came in February, 2004, when he was matched against Julio Cesar Chavez Jr, the son and namesake of the Mexican legend, on the undercard of Erik Morales- Jesus Chavez at the MGM Grand in Las Vegas.

"Buck had fought his dad," recalled Fagan. (Indeed, the 1999 bout between Chavez pere and Smith in Mexico matched two veterans who at the time between them owned an incredible 281 professional wins.) "And he was friendly with Sean Gibbons, who was working as a matchmaker for Top Rank. I think they saw that I'd been stopped the year before and figured I'd be an easy touch, but (Chavez) got a bit more than he bargained for."

The stoppage had come in a 2003 bout against Isaac Mendoza at the Creek Gaming Center in Tulsa. Fagan had five broken bones in his face and was bleeding badly from the nose when the referee stopped it - against Oisín's protests.

And against Chavez he acquitted himself well. Ten seconds before the end of the third, Fagan was dropped for a flash knockdown - his glove barely touched the canvas, and he was up before he went down. But the subsequent count from referee Tony Weeks turned a round Oisín was on the verge of winning 10-9 into a 10-8 round for Chavez, which proved to be the difference on the scorecards in a fight that would otherwise have been no worse than a draw.

He won the coveted Oklahoma title by outpointing Lee Cargle later that summer, and hasn't lost in nearly two years.

Oisín, it turns out, will be fighting for a title this weekend, McDonagh's absence notwithstanding. Peters managed to have the national light-welterweight belt disinterred, and Fagan will battle Jeff Thomas for the vacant Irish 140lb championship on Saturday night. (Thomas was born in Holland and lives in England, but apparently has sufficient Irish connections to qualify under the Granny Rule.) Fagan has been back in Ireland since Sunday and has been working out in Portmarnock each day.

"I wasn't surprised," said Fagan of McDonagh's withdrawal. "I was only surprised that he left it until so near fight time. I'd been looking at the tape of the Gomez fight, and to tell the truth, it was even more suspicious than I'd been led to believe just reading about it. Gomez was kicking his ass for four rounds and then he just walked away. Since my style is similar to Gomez', I was looking forward to fighting Peter - though I don't think he was looking forward to fighting me."