So should Fabio Wardley retire now?

The Ipswich puncher, a former recruitment consultant who found his way to boxing via a quartet of white-collar fights, had never lost like this before. He had never been trounced without landing a punch of his own, in such trouble that his corner had to throw in the towel to save their man.

That must mean, therefore, that he might as well hang them up then. Or at least that seems to be the go-to remedy for any boxer falling short in such fashion these days.

It makes sense, too, given how dangerous this sport can be, particularly at heavyweight. But nowadays we seem far too intent on throwing the baby out with the bath water when it comes to rectifying a problem that caused a defeat.

So Wardley could not beat Dubois, The Ring’s No. 1 heavyweight, despite two bites at the cherry? Sorry mate, it’s the end of the road for you. On the bright side, the recruiters might have you back if you’ve still got a pair of smart shoes.

Wardley is 31 years old and has had 27 fights.

That’s not 27 professional fights, that’s 27 fights in his entire life. Since turning professional nearly a decade ago, the man has only been involved in 96 rounds of action and, given his propensity for knocking people out, completed just 75 of those. That’s 75 completed rounds of boxing in nearly 10 years.

The fact that it is fair game to suggest that this man should just draw a line under his whole career after Saturday’s defeat, for the world heavyweight title, is a sad indictment on where our sport is. It’s adjacent to the obsession with maintaining one’s ‘0’. Defeat in this game is so catastrophic that you’re probably better off just never fighting anyone who might beat you until you really have to. Then, if you do, you’re done.

Retirement was never on the cards for Wardley and he rammed that point home when he was interviewed in the ring. As astute as ever, he pointed out that Dubois has lost and bounced back before, and that would be his example to follow.

He makes a great point. I remember people suggesting that Dubois was done way back in 2020 because he “quit” after having his orbital bone smashed in by Joe Joyce. Now if you put Joyce in with Dubois, people would call the police.

There were similar shouts three years later when Oleksandr Usyk stopped Dubois with a jab but look how he has rebounded from that.

Wind it back even further, to November 2017 and it was a different British heavyweight being advised to retire after he lost to a little-known German bloke called Agit Kabayel in Monaco. I really should see what he’s up to nowadays.

Since then, Chisora has boxed 15 more times, become a British boxing cult hero and secured generational wealth for his privately-educated children.

A few months after Chisora's defeat to Kabayel, a 28-year-old Chris Eubank Jr lost on points to WBA super-middleweight champion George Groves in the semi-final of the World Boxing Super Series. Immediately after, on the ITV broadcast, pundit Prince Naseem Hamed uttered the now very memed line, “I think he should finish.”

But finish, Eubank Jr did not. He has boxed 11 times since then, beaten two-time world champion James DeGale, fought in New York and shared a hugely lucrative two-fight series with Conor Benn. He was not on the scrap heap in 2018 and, looking back, the suggestion was ludicrous.

The counter argument is always that this is a matter of safety, that fighters need to be protected from themselves.

Why, then, did nobody tell Wardley to retire after the first fight with Dubois? He sustained far more damage over the course of those last few painful rounds in Manchester than he did in the quick two in London. Let's not forget that Wardley was only briefly knocked down, to one knee, and was stopped on his feet.

No, the suggestion here is that Wardley losing so quickly to Dubois means he is useless and might as well hang them up. That is a big problem for boxing.

Luckily, Wardley will care little about the opinions of others, unless perhaps they came from his mum or his mrs. Instead, you could quite comfortably name 10 heavyweights he could fight next. He is far from finished and, as Dubois and Eubank Jr have showed, there is every chance the best is yet to come.

Referee Amy Pu was heavily criticised for her decision to kick the towel back out of the ring after Dan Garber's corner had chucked it in during the second round of his clash with Adam Olaniyan on Saturday's undercard.

The fight was about four minutes old and the Bradford southpaw had just been knocked down for the first time. He beat the canvas in frustration and got himself to one knee to clear his head.

He easily beat Pu’s count and looked clear headed as she asked him if he was OK. Unbeknownst to her, Garber’s corner had thrown the towel in and it landed behind her. By this point, she had decided that Garber, in the penultimate fight of the undercard in front of 20,000 people at the O2, was good to go again.

So when she turned round and saw the towel, after Olaniyan had tapped her on the shoulder and pointed it out, Pu had every right to kick it out.

The towel can come in at any point but any stoppage is at the referee’s discretion. She had been closest to Garber, looked in his eyes and done her checks. Even Garber had remonstrated with his corner at the sight of the towel.

It conjured memories of Mickey Vann doing the same during the second round of the 2007 humdinger between Michael Katsidis and Graham Earl. The referee threw the towel out in the second round of that fight and allowed Earl to continue. Of course Earl responded by dropping Katsidis seconds later but eventually lost in the fifth.

Garber had no such comeback as he was stopped a few exchanges later but, from ringside, it looked like Pu had done the right thing.

On the subject of doing the right thing, fair play to Louie O’Doherty for coming out on social media and admitting he lost against Michael Gomez Jr in Saturday’s chief support.

Two ringside judges inexplicably scored the fight a draw, and the third scored it only 115-114 for Gomez, meaning O’Doherty retained his British and Commonwealth lightweight titles. O’Doherty said he scored the fight 8-4 in his opponent’s favor after watching it back and suggested it might “mess him up” by admitting that so openly.

But it really shouldn’t. Such honesty was refreshing from a fighter. The decision was not his fault and he had given everything to defend his titles. Hopefully common sense prevails and the pair can have an immediate rematch. It’s the least a heartbroken Gomez Jr deserves and it sounds like O’Doherty will be willing to do it.