By Elliot Foster

Manchester - For the WBC silver middleweight title, Hassan N'Dam (36-3, 21 KOs) overcame a flash knockdown to win a twelve round majority decision over veteran Martin Murray (37-5-1, 17 KOs), who could be on the verge of retirement with this loss.

Murray, a former four-time world title challenger, took on the former WBO and WBA ‘regular’ world champion at Manchester Arena, exclusively live on BT Sport Box Office.

But he was on the wrong end of a close 12-round contest, as part of the supporting cast to Josh Warrington’s bid to retain his IBF featherweight world title against former two-weight king Carl Frampton.

The three ringside judges saw the contest 114-114, 117-112 and 116-112, with a delighted N’Dam being awarded the win over Murray, who said during fight week that he believed that he was “just one loss away from retirement.”

This was N'Dam's first fight since losing his WBA "regular" middleweight title by way of a knockout loss to Ryota Murata in October of 2017.

The hope for Murray was that he would beat N’Dam and mount a challenge towards another world title in 2019.

But that hope is now firmly out of the window and it will be revealed in due course just what the St Helens man wishes to do next.

For N’Dam, this win will provide him with a new lease of life in the 160-pound division and could mean that he is just a phone call away from a showdown for the WBC world title that is held by Saul ‘Canelo’ Alvarez, who recently moved up to super-middleweight and dethroned Rocky Fielding in their clash for the latter’s WBA ‘regular’ title.