By Eric Thomas: According to the latest boxing news, John Breen, the trainer for former Commonwealth heavyweight champion Martin Rogan (12-1, 6 KOs), said that Rogan’s trainer Frank Warren is reportedly interested in a rematch between Rogan and heavyweight Sam Sexton, who defeated Rogan last Friday night in an 8th round stoppage resulting from a swollen shut left eye of Rogan.
Before that can happen, however, Rogan’s left eye needs to heal up, because as of Friday night, the eyelid had completely closed due to the swelling that had occurred in the fight. Rogan, normally an aggressive fighter, fought much less assertively that he usually does and had major problems with Sexton’s movement, hand speed, power and jab.
Rogan fell behind in the fight and when his left eye began to swell shut in the 7th, Rogan came out on fire in the 8th, looking to score a knockout before the fight could be stopped due to his eye problem. The controversy stemmed from the referee stepping in and taking time to have Sexton’s mouthpiece reinserted while he was taking punishment and looking to be one punch away from a knockout.
Rogan appears to be equally to blame for the outcome of the fight, because when he had Sexton completely out on his feet against the ropes, Rogan stopped fighting and did nothing while he looked at the referee, waiting for him to step in and halt the action.
It wasn’t a wise thing to do, because you never want to assume that a referee is going to do anything whether a fighter is badly hurt or not. It’s up to the fighter to keep punching until the referee pulls them off of their opponent and stops the fight or whatever action there is in the round.
In this case, Rogan waited a few seconds for the referee to step in and was punching twice in the head while he was waiting. Sexton certainly wasn’t going to give up and wait for the referee to come stop the fight, so he just took advantage of Rogan and kept fighting when he had stopped.
The other controversial things that occurred in the round was when the referee Dave Parris stopped Rogan from attacking Sexton when he had turned completely around and was laying up against the ropes with his back facing Rogan.
The referee obviously didn’t see where Rogan had punched Sexton, and thought that he had punched him in the back of the head. However, Rogan actually landed a shot to Sexton’s shoulder area, but even if he had, it wasn’t something that Rogan had set out to do, because it was Sexton who had turned his back on Rogan.
Finally, the last bit of controversy was the referee stopping the fight to have the doctor examine Rogan’s swollen left eye. A lot of boxing fans that saw the fight felt that the referee could have waited until the end of the round to have the doctor examine the eye.
After all, there was only 23 seconds left in the round and Rogan should have at least been permitted to finish it before having the doctor examine the eye.