Katie Taylor voted Ireland’s most admired sports star AGAIN

Katie Taylor retained her status as Ireland’s Most Admired Sports Personality a week before she bids to retain her undisputed champion status in Liverpool.

The Bray fighter and inspiration extended her reign to five years after seeing off competition from past players and now pundits Roy Keane and Brian O’Driscoll in the Oneside poll.

The Bray boxer moved up four points to 25 per cent and will look to strengthen this lead as she returns to the ring on December 11 to defend her undisputed lightweight title, ahead of a box office fight with Amanda Serrano in New York next spring.

Tokyo gold medal star Kellie Harrington – who was recently confirmed as Ireland’s most marketable sports star- entered the top 10 for the first time and is ranked fourth.

Golfer Shane Lowry rounded out this year’s top five Irish sports stars in the eyes of the Irish public, up two places year on year. Onside’s John Trainor said the potential power of sports personalities in Irish society is evidenced by the fact that eight in 10 adults have a sports star they admire most, with three in four Irish females and 86 per cent of Irish men.

According to John Trainor, CEO of Onside: “The right data helps make effective use of sports personality marketing a compelling business case, with our research finding businesses like Aldi and Bank of Ireland regarded as brands that have aligned themselves best with individual Irish sports personalities in the past year.

“Aldi’s alignment with top 10 most admired star [former Ireland and British & Irish Lions captain] Paul O’Connell via its ‘Home’ cookbook and its charity Christmas campaign to raise funds for Barnardos is a role model that is registering highly with the hearts and minds of the Irish public.”

Taylor defends her lightweight collection against Firuza Sharipova at the M&S Arena in Liverpool live on DAZN this weekend.