Gary 'Spike' O'Sullivan came up short in his attempt to become a world middleweight champion in New York on Saturday night.
The 37-year-old was stopped in the eight round by his Cuban opponent Erislandy Lara at the Barclays Centre in Brooklyn.
O'Sullivan was the big outsider against the WBA champion, having agreed to the contest on two months' notice.
And the Corkman struggled to breach the Cuban's tight defensive stance and took a number of shots before being first knocked down in the fourth round of the contest.
O'Sullivan gamely went on and enjoyed his best period in the sixth and seventh rounds.
But Lara (29-3-3, 17KOs) landed a heavy shot on O'Sullivan before the bell in the seventh and continued the onslaught in the eighth before the referee stepped in to end the contest.
“He was a tough boxer,” Lara said afterwards. “I'm a smart boxer, I'm a slick boxer. I waited for him to attack and that's when I made my move. In the fourth, he was leaving himself wide open and that's when my left came in and put [him down].
“I saw at the start of the eighth that he had no more power and that's when I stepped it up with my power.”
It was O'Sullivan's fifth defeat in 36 fights.
The main event saw Gervonta Davis retain his WBA lightweight crown with a sixth-round stoppage of fellow American Rolando Romero.
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