Danny Green was left to ponder retirement after suffering an 11th round knockout to Poland’s Krzysztof Wlodarczyk as the WBC cruiserweight champion retained his title at Perth’s Challenge Stadium.
Wlodarczyk, entering Wednesday’s bout with an impressive 45 wins – 32 of them by knockout – and only two losses, represented one of Green’s toughest opponents.
Even though the 38-year-old West Australian was leading all the cards when the fight was stopped, he has now lost inside the distance in his last two fights.
The defeat follows his IBO title-losing knockout loss to Antonio Tarver four months ago in Sydney, leaving the three-time world champion to admit the time may be right to retire.
“This is it for me guys,” a bloodied Green said.
“He is the best cruiserweight in the world so it’s no shame to lose to him.
“I’ve had an amazing career, I don’t know what I’m going to do yet.
“I came back from a devastating defeat and came out against the best cruiserweight in the world and was four and a half minutes away from a fairytale, but that’s the sport of boxing.”
After feeling each other out in the opening rounds, Green had a massive fifth round where he landed some strong left hooks to Wlodarczyk’s head and body, and some straight rights to have the champ rocking.
But that only served to spark the Pole into action with the 30-year-old stepping it up another gear in just his sixth fight outside Poland, and first title defence out of his native country.
Wlodarczyk began warming to the task with some blows that rocked Green in the seventh round.
The Pole then landed a big right hook midway through round nine, and appeared to be getting right on top.
Green was again on the back foot after some more lofty blows, in that same round, with the ropes saving him on one occasion.
Wlodarczyk took it up another gear in the 10th round with Green just hanging in there despite also picking up a bloody, and potentially broken nose.
Wlodarczyk landed the biggest hit of the night in the 11th round, and added to that less than a minute later to retain his title with a TKO.
“It was a great fight. I want to thank the fans and especially those Polish ones,” Wlodarczyk said after the win.
“I had some problems in the earlier rounds (round five) so I knew I had step it up and I did.”
Earlier, undefeated Australian Will Tomlinson won the vacant IBF super featherweight championship with a unanimous points decision over Mexico’s Alan Herrera.
The judges scored the fight 118-111, 117-111 and 116-111.
Indonesia’s Chris John, meanwhile retained his WBA super featherweight title with a unanimous points decision win over Ukrainian Stanyslav Merdov.
Two judges scored the bout 116-111 to John, with the third scoring it 115-112 to give the 32-year-old, who is yet to be beaten in his 48 fight career, the narrow victory.