IN THE WAKE of a first defeat as a professional boxer, Jason Quigley has spoken about the dark sides of the sport.
Last Thursday night in California, Quigley was beaten by Tureano Johnson, ending a 16-fight unbeaten streak in the paid ranks.
The Donegal puncher joined Nathan Murphy and Andy Lee last night on Off The Ball to reflect on the loss and look at his options for the way back.
“The boxing game doesn’t really hold too many good personalities in it for long. There’s a lot of people who are in it for one thing and that’s to make money,” Quigley noted.
“It’s very hard to find genuine people in the sport. For a while it made me think ‘what is this game all about'”
“Of course it’s a dog-eat-dog kind of a sport, but it’s difficult to thrive in an environment like that. I noticed through my injury that I was kind of forgotten about for a while.”
Quigley lost to Johnson, relinquishing his NABF middleweight title as well as his previously-unblemished professional record, at Fantasy Springs.
After taking several rounds of heavy punishment, Quigley’s trainer, Dominic Ingle, waved the contest off after the ninth round.
The defeat represents a set-back for the Ballybofey man, who was said to be within three fights of a shot at a world title before he was undone by the experienced Johnson.
Quigley spoke about the death of Russian boxer Maxim Dadashev and also about the criticism from Matthew Macklin about the management of his career.
Watch the full interview below …