SAM SEXTON TKO8 (eye injury) MARTIN ROGAN

Sad to say, the Cinderella Story of late-starting Belfast heavyweight Martin Rogan seems to have run its course.

Rogan is tough and game, but the 38-year-old’s limited boxing skills were all too glaringly apparent when he lost his Commonwealth title to Sam Sexton on Friday night, although the eighth-round ending was controversial.

Sexton knows how to box and move, and while he isn’t considered a big hitter he punches with authority. For most of the first seven rounds he was able to keep out of Rogan’s way and pick off his strong but crude opponent, to the disappointment of the Belfast crowd.

When Rogan’s left eye began to swell and shut from underneath in the sixth round he was clearly going to need to do something dramatic, and he almost pulled it out in the eighth round when he had the 24-year-old Sexton wobbly and almost out on his feet from a couple of heavy right hands, one of which sent the fighter from Norwich in eastern England slumping back into the ropes.

What happened next has been widely documented. With Sexton floundering and turning his back on Rogan, referee Dave Parris stopped the action to issue a warning to the Belfast fighter for throwing a punch to the back of his opponent’s head. Then we had the bizarre incident of Rogan standing back when it looked as if one more heavy punch could have ended the fight in his favour, because Sexton’s hands were down and he was, at that moment, an open target.

It seems that Rogan was looking to the referee to pick up Sexton’s mouthpiece, which the Norwich fighter had seemingly spat out to buy himself some time. The window of opportunity closed. Sexton even threw some punches while Rogan wasn’t looking. By the time the gum shield had been replaced Sexton had got himself back together and it was just a matter of keeping out of further trouble until Rogan’s eye injury brought matters to a conclusion, because the local favourite was too tired to mount another assault.

The underdog Sexton demonstrated that he was the better fighter, but he had an awfully narrow escape. If Rogan had kept punching instead of standing back at the critical juncture in the eighth round he would most likely have won — but he didn’t. For whatever reason — inexperience, confusion, plus being, perhaps, too nice a fellow — Rogan failed to pull out one of the greatest back-from-the-brink wins in British ring history.

We will never know if the valuable seconds of recovery time — the warning to Rogan, the gum shield replacement — saved the day for Sexton, but he was teetering on the precipice of defeat, and Rogan missed his chance to push him over the edge.