BRIGHTON, ENGLAND – Boxers who have just endured a defeat often cling to the belief that circumstances somehow conspired against them and that, on a different night, they would have won the fight.

Not Tyrone McKenna, however.

Following a one-sided loss to the rising Harlem Eubank in Brighton, England, that came when the referee John Latham rescued him in the 10th round, Northern Ireland’s McKenna admitted two things: there was no way he could have won the fight and the two knockdowns scored against him should in fact have been four.

Latham counted over McKenna in the seventh and 10th rounds following head shots that dropped the 35 year old. Yet he was on the canvas on two other occasions during the welterweight bout, with the falls being attributed to slips. 

“It was the right decision [to stop the fight] because I got dropped four times really because of the body shots,” McKenna, 24-6-1 (7 KOs), said post-fight. “I wanted to finish the fight, but I was never going to win; it was the right decision.”

McKenna, who will consider his future after this defeat, was full of praise for a man he was previously convinced he had the beating of.

“He was very, very hard to pin down,” McKenna said of Eubank, a fighter he believes can go on and challenge for world titles. “My game plan was to box him and if it wasn’t working, go for a war, but I couldn’t even go for a war because he’s a very good boxer. He was slipping; he was throwing dangerous shots. I wouldn’t say they were hurting me but, because of the speed and accuracy, they were putting me down and I had to be cautious going in every time. Speed is power. 

“He's very good. He’s very sharp; he’s come on a long way from the first fights that he’s had. 

“I’m just an old man now,” McKenna chuckled, “so he took advantage of an old man.” 

Eubank, 21-0 (9 KOs), stepped in to add: “He’s a tough old man, they don’t come much tougher. He fights for his people, he always comes out and never lies down, and you saw that.”