That’s how, I recall, the great Muhammad Ali – the Greatest, in fact, if you asked the man himself – lost a match. That was a match against Larry Holmes and that match was in 1980, when Ali, at the age of 38, was long past his prime. He lost the 15-round matchup to a younger, stronger and hungrier former sparring partner Holmes after 10 rounds. Too tired, beaten up and defenseless, Ali, at the order of his manager, did not leave the stool at the sound of the bell for the 11th round.

A terrible scenario, for me. I was pained, saddened, stunned, flatly knocked out by the sequence of events I saw on the small screen. I remember the pain vividly because it must have been one of the first great sporting events to be broadcast live in China (thanks to the reform and opening up policy pioneered by Deng Xiaoping) and I, then 14, had only come to watch Ali win. Instead, I saw my man beaten, battered and helpless. Each time he hobbled, I wished Ali would this very instant deliver one of his stinging combinations to knock out Holmes, who was unbeknownst to me, in stunning fashion. But alas, it was not to be. Ali had no chance – “None of the three voting judges gave Ali a round,” the New York Times (October 3, 1980) reported later.

Anyways, Ali lost a match by not answering the bell.

Hence the idiom. If one answers the bell, one is ready to face up a challenge, in other words ready to fight.

Or, to use another cliché, if one answers the bell, they “rise to the occasion”.

【Answer the bell?】相关文章：

★ 怎么学英语听力？

★ 由《新概念英语》谈寻找兴趣点与英语的结合

★ 新东方名师谈新概念系列语法

★ 英语学习成功之道

★ 学习方法 学好英语的42个要决

★ 筑就孩子终身幸福——素质教育，社会做什么？

★ 小学趣味英语动物世界-动物单词

★ 新概念英语“民间”背诵方法大集合

★ 新概念英语学习手册：新老教材选择

★ 学习方法：提高英语写作能力从句子入手