A British boxing manager named Johnny Arrow once said to me back in the 1960s about an exciting and very popular middleweight prospect he was guiding named Mark Rowe: “If Mark won every fight in his career on a first-round knockout his fans would go home happy every time."

I think that the Irish middleweight John Duddy inspires that sort of loyalty and devotion.

Take his 10-round main event against the little known although ostensibly more experienced Shelby Pudwill at the Theater at Madison Square Garden on Thursday. The 5,000-capacity arena is a sellout for a fight that seems to be a mismatch. It is a showcase for Duddy — everyone seems to know it but no one really cares: they just want to see Duddy fight and, all being well, add another knockout to a record that stands at 15 consecutive wins with 13 opponents halted inside schedule, eight in the opening round.

Duddy has struck a chord with the New York fans in general but, obviously, the Irish community in particular. People are taken with his work ethic and down-to-earth personality, it helps to have what old-time Hollywood press agents would call rugged good looks while in the ring he brings a straightforward, come-to-fight style with the potential to get an opponent in trouble at any moment if he can hit them cleanly with either the right hand or the left hook.

The 26-year-old from Ireland’s fourth-largest city of Derry is still at the learning stage of his career and lately he has been finding out that not everyone goes away when he hits them, having been taken the distance in two of his last six fights, including a one-sided 10-round decision victory over the Haitian, Julio Jean, in his last fight, while veteran Pat Coleman almost made it to the final bell, being overpowered with 30 seconds remaining in the eighth and final round last July.

Going the distance and winning in the late rounds is all part of a fighter’s education and not at all a bad thing, of course. Duddy now knows, for instance, that he can maintain a strong pace for 10 rounds. When the other fighter poses problems, if only by being stubborn and knowing how to survive, it forces the big puncher to think things out and concentrate his mind on how in similar situations an improved result could be achieved: it’s all about smoothing rough edges, fine tuning and paying attention to the little details.

So far everything has been going the way it is supposed to go in Duddy’s career. Some of his opponents have been naturally smaller men — I understand one even had to have a big meal before weighing in so that there would not be too large a disparity in weights — or older fighters, but the Duddy camp rolled the dice in a risky fight with another unbeaten and motivated fighter, Leonord Pierre, last March on ESPN2, and the Irish boxer blasted right through his most dangerous opponent in just 83 seconds. This was the fight that, I think, really got Duddy noticed on boxing’s bigger stage.

A shutout eight-round decision over Patrick Thompson went somewhat unnoticed on the undercard of a Miguel Cotto HBO show at Madison Square Garden but this was a solid performance by Duddy because his opponent from Nebraska was resilient and game and had been competitive in narrow losses against the unbeaten Giovanni Lorenzo and Minnesota favourite Matt Vanda while putting up a respectable showing against the talented Sechew Powell in another full-distance fight. The win over Thompson and the ones over Pat Coleman and Julio Jean were what could be called learning fights for Duddy, and I have the feeling that in the Garden’s sister arena on Thursday, the night before St. Patrick’s Day, he will be looking to do something spectacular.

Pudwill, 30, looks the perfect opponent. He has a respectable record of 21 wins, two losses and a draw (only nine opponents halted) but the reality is that he has been boxing against for the most part extremely weak and in some cases novice-type opposition and usually at home in North Dakota.

Although he has won eight bouts in a row he has boxed just four times in the past three years. A decision loss to the journeyman Rudy Lovato, who had 19 losses on his record, seems to tell us all we need to know about Pudwill. However, he has twice been 10 rounds and while he was stopped in four rounds by the Las Vegas boxer Carl Cockerham that was six years ago and one would have to assume that Pudwill is now stronger and more mature. Unfortunately for Pudwill, though, on Thursday he is going in with a much more powerful, heavier handed and better fighter in a front of a crowd that will want to see him get knocked out.

The fact that Pudwill has had more professional bouts than Duddy means nothing. Duddy was an Irish amateur champion, boxed internationally and was highly competitive against future Olympic gold medallist Andre Ward in Dublin five years ago, while as a professional even though Duddy has been matched sensibly and carefully he has faced a better quality of opposition than the type of opponent Pudwill has been meeting.

Pudwill’s older brother, Tocker Pudwill, was a competent type of boxer who went 12 rounds in a title fight with Sven Ottke in Germany and gave Vinny Paz a stiff tussle in the veteran crowd pleaser’s last fight although he was crushed in two rounds by Joe Calzaghe.

If Pudwill can box and move in similar fashion to his older brother the crowd just might see Duddy extended for several rounds on Thursday but my suspicion is that this fight probably will not last very long.

I do not think it unfair to say that Duddy’s defence is not his strongest point, and indeed he was knocked down in an early fight although he got up to stop his opponent in the same round — the first — but Pudwill does not seem to have anything like the punching power needed to make Duddy respect him. As they say in the trade: “What’s he got to keep him off with?"

There is the possibility that Pudwill will go into the fight determined at least not to get stopped, and if he gets on bicycle it could prolong the inevitable, but in front of a packed, pumped-up crowd in the mood for a St. Paddy’s eve celebration I have to think that Duddy will be going after his man in an extremely aggressive fashion. If Pudwill gets past the midway stage of the fight I think he will have done well.