Paul Gallen vs Nelson Asofa-Solomona: A Fight for Respect
Paul Gallen says the money is good. But this time, it’s not about the cheque.
It’s about payback.
Lured out of retirement and back into the ring, the 45-year-old has set his sights firmly on Nelson Asofa-Solomona, vowing to teach the Melbourne Storm giant “a lesson in respect” when the pair collide in a five-round heavyweight showdown in Sydney on November 6.
The bout pits two premiership-winning NRL enforcers against each other, but Gallen insists this isn’t a novelty crossover or a farewell cash grab. In his eyes, Asofa-Solomona crossed a line long before the contracts were signed.
Gallen says he was the one who opened the boxing door for the Storm forward, picking up the phone to No Limit Boxing to help get him involved in the sport. Not as a favour to a mate, he stresses, but as a professional courtesy from one fighter to another.
That’s why the constant public call-outs have cut so deep.
“So for him to then sign with them and to be calling me out after every fight he's had, it's just not a bloke thing to do. I don't think it's the right thing to do,” Gallen told AAP, making no attempt to soften the edges.
He’d made it clear he was done. Sixteen months earlier he had walked away after beating Sonny Bill Williams, the former WBA heavyweight world champion and fellow league icon. The story was supposed to end there.
Instead, every time Asofa-Solomona’s hand was raised, Gallen’s name followed.
“I told him I was done. I told him I was finished. He had all that intimate knowledge and now he can't stop calling me out. I'm going to smash his face in.”
The promoters saw an opening. No Limit, struggling to find credible opponents for the two-metre wrecking ball they’d signed to a nine-fight, multi-year deal, came hard for Gallen. He says he knocked back a million-dollar offer to face “The Big Nasty”.
They came back with more.
Eventually, the numbers climbed high enough and the insults cut deep enough. The answer changed.
Gallen will walk into the ring conceding around 20 centimetres in height and 15 years in age. Asofa-Solomona is 29, in his physical prime, and has looked a level above in his first three professional outings, brushing aside former NRL forwards Jeremy Latimore, Jarrod Wallace and George Burgess.
On paper, the size and youth advantages are obvious. Gallen shrugs at both.
He’s heard all this before. He heard it before Sonny Bill, the taller, longer, more decorated boxer who was meant to outclass him. Instead, Gallen walked him down and broke him apart in July last year, then walked away with his reputation as No Limit’s hardened headline act firmly intact.
The former NSW State of Origin captain has already made an estimated $25 million from 16 wins in the ring as the promotional company’s long-time poster boy. He doesn’t need this fight to pay the bills, and he doesn’t rate his opponent’s ceiling in the sport either.
In Gallen’s blunt assessment, Asofa-Solomona is a poor boxer with no genuine future at the top level.
What he really can’t stomach, though, is the way his name has been used as a launch pad.
“After his second fight when he called me out, I was like, 'mate, stand on your own two feet. Be a man. Make your own way in boxing, stop using my name to',” Gallen said.
There were no call-outs for Curtis Scott. None for Junior Paulo. Both younger, both active, both with league reputations of their own. Instead, the focus stayed on the retired 45-year-old who had already said he was finished.
“He wasn't calling out Curtis Scott. He's not calling out Junior Paulo. They're footy players. They're younger. I'm 45. He keeps bringing up my name after the fact because he knows I didn't want to do this anymore.
“I'm just really disappointed in that. It's just not brave. He's a f***ing rat for it and he's lit a fire in me that's made me want to come back and I get to try and do something about it.”
So the stage is set: the ageing warhorse against the towering enforcer he helped usher into the game. One chasing a legacy, the other chasing a statement.
On November 6, only one of them walks away with their version of respect intact.
