Phil Sutcliffe Jr – “I learned a lot from that fight”

Phil Sutcliffe Jr entered the big leagues on Saturday night with a points win over Welshman Chris Jenkins on the Belfast Boxnation show.

A close back-and-forth battle, the Dublin light welter took a 98:93 decision on referee Hugh Russell Jr’s card. While the scoreline was laughably wide, the fight itself was razor-close and Sutcliffe believes that he will learn a lot from the win over his more experienced opponent.

Sutcliffe [12(7)-1(0)] downed his Garnant opponent with a short left in the opening round, and in hindsight he feels he could have ended the clash there and then. However, the Dubliner, who went past eight rounds for the first time, feels better for the experience and told Irish-Boxing.com “I should have put a bit a more pressure on him and it probably would have been an early night.”

“I just stepped back a little, where I should have just kept going. I could have made it a lot easier for myself. I learned a lot from that fight. It will all stand to me in the future.”

“This was a tough man and I really really learned a lot from that fight, It’s something that I will take away with me and bring back to the gym and work on every day.”

Crediting his opponent, the Crumlin man described how “it was a very tough fight, I must hand it to Chris, he was a lot tougher than I thought. I thought he would have went a little earlier, Chris was a very tough opponent.”

In terms of what’s next, an immediate rematch with Jenkins appeals – although this may be thwarted by a hand injury suffered by the Welshman. Therefore a fight with Belfast’s Tyrone McKenna, who defeated Sutciffe’s good friend Sean Creagh for the BUI Celtic Warrior belt on the same card on Saturday, seems to be the fight which appeals most.

When asked about the future, Sutcliffe pin-pointed his MGM stablemate and noted how “we’ll see what happens, on to bigger and better things. I heard Tyrone McKenna calling me out after the fight, I’ll fight him if he wants, I’ll fight him for the Irish title and the Celtic Warrior belt if he wants.”