Carl Frampton was quite critical of his performance in the immediate aftermath of his U.S. debut victory over Alejandro González Jr. While he was disappointed after the bout in El Paso, upon reflection the Belfast super bantamweight now has a more positive view of his stateside debut

Speaking to Off The Ball on Newstalk 106, Frampton gave an in depth analysis of his second successful defence of his IBF title.

‘The Jackal’ admitted that “initially after the fight I was a bit disappointed with my performance – it was the first time I’d been on my backside in my life.”

However he feels that “watching it back, especially with American commentary, it was an okay performance considering I wasn’t at my best.”

Much like football pundits who say that winning while playing badly is the sign of champions, Frampton believes that “if you’re winning at least ten of the twelve rounds when you’re only maybe at 50% of your best then I suppose it’s not a bad thing. I know that I’m much better than that.”

The 28 year old reasoned that “I adapted pretty early on, after the first round I changed my game plan.”

“In the end, if you take the first round, I won pretty comfortably.”

“Not taking anything away from Alejandro González, but if you rule that first round out – which was a pretty bad round on my behalf – I probably won ten out of the rest of the eleven rounds.”

On the two first round knockdowns, the Tiger’s Bay boxer explained that “my head was clear, I was absolutely fine, they were two flash knockdowns. The first one I was kinda off balance, the second one was a good shot, but my head was clear straight away.”

Nevertheless, the two trips to the canvas came as a massive shock to the champion, who described the experience as being “an alien feeling to me. I was just thinking, what’s going on here?”

On whether he may need to adjust his in-ring approach, Frampton added, “I don’t think I need to change my style, I don’t think I have to question my chin or anything like that.”

“They were a couple of flash knockdowns, I’ve a very very solid chin – I spar big guys, I spar welterweights, I spar light middleweights. I get hit about the head a lot.”

“These things happen. It hadn’t happened to me before, but I don’t think I’ll have to change my style.”

With refreshing honesty, Frampton explained that “I think as a team, we probably overlooked this guy a bit and we thought it was going to be much easier than it was.”

“I hold my hand up, I think I overlooked him a bit, I thought it was gonna be much easier than it was.”

‘The Jackal’ was impressed with the surprisingly game challenge of González Jr. noting that “he’s a young Mexican, he had a young family, he had a big chance to upset me and he went out and had a brilliant first round. But luckily enough I pulled it back and got the win.”

“The kid was a good fighter, very clever, I think he can do something in the future.”

Frampton openly admits that “we got away with it. It was a tough fight. People weren’t expecting it to be a tough fight. I don’t think the bookies were even expecting it to be a tough fight.”

“But we got away with it and that’s the main thing, I live to fight again. I know there’s much more to come.”

Finally, describing the physical toll of the bout, Frampton joked “my body’s in good shape, I’m feeling okay. My hand is a little bit sore, in and around the nether regions are a bit sore.”

“I took a few low punches. It’s pretty bruised up down there, I had a big cup protector on, Maybe he fancied me!”

“After about the fifth time, the referee was having a word with him, and I remember looking to my corner and Shane just said to me “hit him back!”, so I just drilled one straight back into him.”