Ryan Walsh’s principles have probably held him back over the years.

The former long-reigning British featherweight champion has always placed much more value on glory and honor than money and fame and his absolute refusal to turn down a challenge has seen him walk directly into scenarios that other fighters would have been cleverly guided around.

But then, Walsh has always wanted to do things properly. 

“I stopped cheating at Monopoly and cheating in games since I was a kid because if I have to cheat to win, I don't want to play. It's no fun, is it? I'm the best cheat, wow,” he told BoxingScene.

“We learned quite quickly as kids that if you were a banker, you won at Monopoly, and that was it. You had unlimited funds. So, no, it's not for me.

“I play Call of Duty on my PC. I know for a fact there's loads of cheaters and I still can't work out what fun you get. The actual Xbox and PlayStation players can’t cheat, they can't buy mods. Actually, they might be able to put mods on the joypad, but in general they can't cheat. But these PC players, they’re the jerks, I hate them. I’m part of the PC scene and the problem, but I can't cheat, so I don't look for these things to do.

“I can’t fathom what joy you get out of that and that’s from the smallest thing to the biggest thing.

“I’ll never understand the cheater's mindset. I can’t understand it. I want to be able to do it with my own hands.

“If I can’t do it, then I can’t do it. No problem, but I’m not going to cheat to do it.”

Walsh, 28-4-2 (12 KOs), is 38 years old and has boxed only three times since losing to Jazza Dickens in the final of MTK’s Golden Contract featherweight tournament back in 2020, but he has never stopped looking for a fight. The following year he did what no other fighter in Britain would do and paid to fight tough, dangerous Scotsman, Ronnie Clark. He then stepped up to lightweight and lost a decision to an in-form Maxie Hughes.

The language of the previous paragraph should be tidied up slightly. Walsh hasn’t been looking for a fight. He has been looking for the right fight.

For most 38-year-old former champions, that means a one-sided farewell appearance in front of his own fans or a high-profile opportunity that comes neatly packaged with the type of payday which eases bruised pride should things go badly.

Ryan Walsh isn’t most fighters.

Before he retires, Walsh wants to find the person capable of testing him as a fighter but also as a man. He wants to be tired and hurt. He wants to be put in the type of desperate situation where others might be tempted to cheat themselves and look for an easy way out and he wants to come through it and win fairly. 

On September 27, Walsh will travel to Sheffield for a fight with Reece Mould, 18-2 (6 KOs), and there is the definite sense that, after 16 years as a professional, he may be about to find exactly what he has been looking for. 

“I’d never got round to telling anyone, but I'd agreed to fight Henry Turner at light welter but the board then, obviously, did the right thing and gave the Commonwealth champion [Jack Rafferty] the shot. But I’d agreed to it,” he said.

“I just liked the idea of ten stone (140lbs), because I’m walking around just under 11. I feel my best at probably ten stone, six or seven, so I thought this is a win-win for me. I'll get in the ring, I won't put loads of weight on and I've been known to do good work at that, So I thought, this guy's struggling. I'm going to go to his guts, whatever, and then that fell out of bed. 

“It was a shot to nothing. It was a fight. I want to fight, and I've been training but I had two or three weeks of getting excited but as soon as it came, it went. It was just nice to be excited and be in the gym, but this one is so much better.

“It’s at lightweight. The style’s better. He’s an orthodox fighter. He said stupid things. I don’t think he believes it, but let’s see if he can hang his hat on it because you can’t tell me that you think…….” Walsh stops himself dead in his tracks and actually has to gather himself before finishing his sentence.

“Liam [Walsh’s brother, the talented former world title challenger] told me he’s saying he can stop me.”

Walsh is at once enraged, disgusted, intrigued and thrilled by the very idea.

Enraged and disgusted because although he has been outboxed by slick, clever southpaws Hughes, Dickens and Lee Selby, he doesn’t believe that anybody could gather even the smallest scrap of evidence to suggest that it is possible to stop him but intrigued and thrilled because maybe, just maybe, Mould might be willing to try. 

“I was like, what? Cheeky c*nt. What does he mean he can stop me?” he said. “I didn't believe it. I’m sat right across from him. He's looking away from me. He's quite nervous. He doesn't believe what he's saying. He doesn't believe it. It's one thing backing yourself but he doesn't believe he can knock me out. I don't believe that he believes that. He's just saying it.

“I don't know why he's saying it. It's mystifying to me but it's good because when he said it, I told him, ‘Thank you for saying that because if I was ever looking past you, around you or not taking you seriously…..’

“Two men have done that. James Tennyson done it, and the Cuban [Hairon Socarras] done it.

“The Cuban done it after the first round. I give it to him in the first round and at the end of the round, he went, ‘I'm going to knock you out.’  I walked back to the corner. I was like, ‘He just said he's going to knock me out.’ It was mental. He's going to knock me out, is he? This guy sat across from me. He wasn't looking me in the eye when he said it.”

Walsh stopped the dangerous Tennyson in five rounds back in 2016 and dominated Socarras over nine in 2019.

Socarras may not have believed what he was saying but Mould has yet to be proven a liar. The 29-year-old frustrates his own team by making things harder for himself than they need be, leaving his skills in the gym and leaning too heavily on his determination and love of a fight. He boxed well against Gary Cully last November – appearing extremely unlucky to lose a split decision – but the second he senses that an opponent is willing to hold their feet with him, it is highly likely that he will dispense with his game plan and fight. 

Walsh’s chase might have finally come to an end. 

“It’s easy saying it. Let’s just try and do it. If he can step in the middle of that ring and come to fight me, hallelujah,” Walsh said. 

“That's all I can ask. Honestly, I still don't believe it because it feels like I asked for it. Before this fight was made, I remember saying to my brothers that I've gone through my career, and I've not been in a down and dirty.

“I've tried with the Cuban. I’ve tried with Tennyson. I've tried with Darren Traynor. They didn’t have that for me. Maybe he [Mould] will at lightweight. I want to fight. I want to be involved in one of them.

“We’ll see if he’s up to it. If you fight me and you declare war on me, I think that's a barbaric way to go.” 

John Evans has contributed to a number of well-known publications and websites for over a decade. You can follow John on X @John_Evans79