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<\/a><\/p>\n“There was a small option of an escape and he took it,” Tszyu told reporters in Sydney on Friday.<\/p>\n
I honestly just thought that once the first opportunity came, that he saw the out, and was like ‘yes, while I still can, it will be a no contest’.<\/p>\n
“He knew the ramifications of it all, he’s an experienced veteran.<\/p>\n
“I don’t think he was looking for it, but once he saw it, he couldn’t un-see it.”<\/p>\n
The much-hyped clash of the Australians ended in furore when the fight was declared a no contest after Zerafa suffered a cut eye in an accidental head clash.<\/p>\n
Zerafa was heard by television microphones complaining he couldn’t see, and later said he’d suffered a fractured eye socket.<\/p>\n
“A fractured eye socket, that puffs up instantly and his eye was good for a while.<\/p>\n
“I saw him in the change rooms, his eye looked all right.”<\/p>\n
Tszyu described the result as “a big let-down”.<\/p>\n
Asked if he felt robbed, he replied: “I do. In, like, a very shameful way.<\/p>\n
“A lot of work went into that and it was just taken away.<\/p>\n
“It was the biggest opportunity for me to really show myself, prove myself to the world.”<\/p>\n
“We’re just planning on moving forward, getting that world ranking higher and higher to get that inevitable world title in the end,” he said.<\/p>\n
“We don’t have a time frame when that is going to happen, but that is all we’re building towards.”<\/p>\n
But he was certain about what Zerafa’s future should hold: retirement.<\/p>\n
“He has had a great career, he has done a lot in the sport,” Tszyu said.<\/p>\n
“But I just don’t think he’s mentally there anymore – and it’s nothing to be ashamed of, it just happens.<\/p>\n
“It’s the hardest sport for a reason. While you still have your brain cells, while you’re still healthy, get out … get out while you can.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Nikita Tszyu says he was robbed of proving his boxing worth in a shameful way by Michael Zerafa…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":431667,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[571],"tags":[64,63,802,85],"class_list":["post-431666","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-boxing","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-boxing","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/431666","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=431666"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/431666\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/431667"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=431666"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=431666"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=431666"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}