He is one of the few people in Australia to have seen Ali fight and was there right at the beginning of his career. 

The man commonly regarded as the world’s greatest ever boxer – and showman – died on Saturday at the age of 74. 

Mr Di Cesare, a Ballarat man, was in Rome at the Olympics in 1960. 

On Sunday he described the scene just after the light heavyweight semi-final between an 18-year-old Cassius Clay and Australian fighter Tony Madigan: 

“After the game, they give the win to Cassius, the public went berserk. The public made the Australian the winner,” he said. 

“He was a showman, instead of fighting. The Australian landed more blows than him.”

Mr Di Cesare was an interpretor and general helper for the Australian rowing team in 1960. 

The braggadocio that became Ali’s trademark was there the entire time, Mr Di Cesare said. 

“He wasn’t a big known (athlete), because he was still young but after the game, everybody knew him,” he said. 

“After the game, everywhere he went he was yelling ‘I am the greatest’.” 

“He was never without the gold, the rest of the games.” 

Mr Di Cesare had moved to Ballarat in the early 1950s, so was coming into his second experience of the Olympics. 

Incredibly, in what could be a sign of the racially-divided times, he said Ali was booed by American athletes as well as Italian spectators. 

Mr Di Cesare said he shook Ali’s hand after the fight. 

The Australian Tony Madigan won bronze and was content with how far he got, Mr Di Cesare said. 

“He was very, very, happy,” he said. 

“(But) he never had a mark on his face from the fight.” 

Mr Di Cesare’s brush with Ali was not his only exposure to greatness at those Games. 

He met a saint. 

The rowing was held at Lake Albano, where Pope John XXIII had his summer residence. 

“One day, the team was invited to meet the Pope...and we went (to his summer residence), and I went there too,” he said.  

“So I met the Pope. Actually I shook hands with him, and he asked me, he find out where I’m from.” 

“I never mention it because I reckon people won’t believe me.” 

John XXIII’s short papacy was remarkable because he called the Second Vatican Council and helped the world avoid nuclear obliteration by intervening in the Cuban Missile Crisis months before his death.