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Josh Taylor 19-0 (13) is planning to move up to welterweight following his controversial split decision victory over mandatory challenger Jack Catterall 26-1 (13) at The SSE Hydro in Glasgow, Scotland on Saturday night.
The WBC, WBA, WBO and IBF junior welterweight champion struggled early on against Catterall and was dropped in the eighth round. Both boxers were docked a point late in the fight – Catterall for holding in the 10th and Taylor for punching after the bell in the 11th.
Judge Howard Foster saw the fight 113-112 for Catterall, overruled by Ian John-Lewis and Victor Loughlin who scored the fight for Taylor 114-111 and 113-112 respectively.
The dubious result was enough to prompt the British Boxing Board of Control to announce they will be investigating the scoring.
The 31-year-old Taylor believes he did enough to get the nod.
“I have taken a few days for some well-earned time with my family after not seeing them for a few months,” Taylor said.
“I’ve had a chance to watch the fight back. First and foremost, I want to congratulate Jack Catterrall on a great fight. He rose to the occasion and fought a valiant fight. However, I believe I won a very close fight.
“Many fans believe Jack deserved the decision, and that’s fine. We both went in there and fought our guts out for 12 rounds… but the personal attacks on myself and especially my family are disgusting and uncalled for.
“My days at 140 are numbered. My future is at welterweight. Jack Catterall deserves another title shot and as soon as possible.
“I’ve never ducked a challenge in my career and I’d be happy to fight Jack again, but it would have to be at welterweight. Jack is a great sportsman, a helluva fighter and deserves every bit of admiration he’s been receiving.
“I want to thank my family, my team, the fans who packed the OVO Hydro, and everyone who watched on Sky Sports, ESPN+, and around the world.
“Fighting as the undisputed champion on Scottish soil as a dream come true, but I’m only getting started. I’ll be back and better than ever, this time ready to conquer the welterweight division.”
At 5-foot-10 the move up to 147-pounds for Taylor may be well overdue. But there are no easy marks at welterweight, with the undefeated duo of Errol Spence Jr 27-0 (21) and Terence Crawford 38-0 (29) holding three of the four major world titles.
“To be honest, I made the weight pretty well,” Taylor said after the fight. “I made the weight good, but it is getting harder to make that weight, you know? It is getting harder. That, most likely, will be my last fight at 140. But we’ll sit down with my team.
“And I left it a little bit late as well to start the preparations for making the weight cut that fight, with injuries and stuff, you know, so we left a little bit of taking the weight off because I couldn’t get the weight off in the time with the times with my conditioning and things like that, with my knee injury and stuff.”
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