Mick Conlan doesn’t want to be known for just his middle finger

In very modern fashion, Mick Conlan‘s middle finger has gone ‘viral’ – but the Belfast man wants to be known for his fighting rather than his gesturing.

Following his highly dubious loss to Vladimir Nikitin in the Olympic bantamweight quarter final, Conlan directed his third digits at the ringside judges in Rio, an image which would circulate around the World.

When he signed his professional contract with Top Rank on Monday, Conlan and his new team replicated the image for press photos. Even while shooting an episode of new quiz-show ‘Know The Score’ for RTÉ, Conlan’s ‘team-mates’ Ruby Walsh and Stephen Hunt gave their take on the ‘fingers up’ pose.

The 24 year old however is wary of the pose becoming a gimmick, and is looking forward to allowing his boxing do the talking when he debuts on St Patrick’s Day in Madison Square Garden next year.

Irish-Boxing.com asked whether Conaln prefers the ‘lovable bad boy’-type image currently being propagated, or if he would rather more of a ‘golden boy’ persona, and he replied “I don’t know, possibly, possibly the other way, and possibly the ‘finger’ way.”

“It was Top Rank that wanted to do the pictures with the finger up so I went along with it.”

“Bob [Arum] liked it, Bob liked everything I done, and he respected everything I said. It was nice for someone like him to be saying that – so middle fingers up and that’s what happened in the photograph.”

“People are thinking that it’s going to be my trademark, but nah, I’ll try to get away from it.”