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CHAMP SAM'S COMMON TOUCH

VICTORIOUS: Sam Sexton

Sunday November 8,2009

By Niall Hickman

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SAM SEXTON retained his Commonwealth heavyweight title following a scintillating re-match with Martin Rogan in Belfast on Friday night – and then warned there was better to come.

Former Belfast cabbie Rogan thought he would have won their first showdown had it not been for a badly swollen eye and he came flying out at the bell in the re-match, backed by a partisan home crowd at the Odyssey Arena.

Sexton weathered the storm as Rogan swarmed all over him and in the sixth round the Norwich fighter’s superior boxing skills emerged as he delivered one telling blow after another.

Rogan, 38, failed to get up for the seventh round and claimed a neck injury had forced him to retire.

“I’m still the champion, there’s plenty more to come, plenty of better stuff to come as well,” said Sexton, 25.

“I always feel relaxed, it’s the best way to fight. It prevents you from making mistakes.

“Martin Rogan’s a big puncher and I had to keep my guard up, but it’s onwards and upwards for me.

“David Haye or Nikolai Valuev would be a dream fight for me. I would take on either of them in a heartbeat.”

Rogan said: “Sam keeps illustrating he’s 25 and I felt like I was 55 in there at the end.

“I had a neck injury from the last fight and I think it just happened again and with some pushing down on my head. It must have trapped a nerve or something.

“My left arm just went numb and there was no way I could defend myself.”

Northern Ireland’s Paul McCloskey, 30, retained his unbeaten record on the same bill and picked up the vacant European light-welterweight title with a ninth-round knockout of Spaniard Daniel Rasilla.