Dillian Whyte apologises to trainer Buddy McGirt after KO defeat

Buddy McGirt revealed that Dillian Whyte apologised to him after his fight

Following Dillian Whyte's (31-4, 21 KOs) disastrous first-round knockout defeat to Moses Itauma (13-0, 11 KOs) in Riyadh last weekend, 'The Body Snatcher' apologised to his American trainer, Buddy McGirt after the fight.

The 61-year-old coach from New York told Seconds Out how Dillian was doing after taking such a bruising beating, “He’s good, his spirits are good. He was down for a bit last night, but now he’s getting better.

“He’s apologised. I’m like, there’s nothing to apologise for, this is the game we’re in, it happens sometimes. This is the sport we’re in. You stepped in the ring, you did what you had to do, it went the way it went, but you don’t owe anyone an apology.

The Boxing Writers Association of America Trainer of the Year 2002 then praised his heavyweight charge, “He steps up to the plate, he takes on anybody, nobody wanted to fight Moses, he stepped up. Nobody has the mentality of Dillian.”

Derek Chisora notably revealed that he was offered £2 million to fight Itauma and promptly turned it down. Whyte, however, accepted the fight with no qualms.

The 37-year-old Brixton boxer got himself into fine shape for the fight, clearly treating it as serious as his world title challenge to Tyson Fury in 2022, weighing in at 244lbs, the lowest he has weighed since 2015.

However, when the bell sounded in Saudi, he fell short with his slow jabs, allowing Moses to counter with ease and begin to back up and walk him down as the young lion picked the right shots to break the guard and do the damage.

The 20-year-old from Chatham hurt Whyte to send him back into the ropes, then went in for the kill and landed a short right hook to the temple as Dillian was stumbling around. The Jamaican-born Brit got back to his feet but was in no safe condition to continue, the knockout registered at 1:59 of round one .

McGirt, a former two-weight world champion from Long Island, offered his take on the fight, “He did have an injury a couple of weeks ago but he said he was going to go through with the fight. Everything was good until he got hit with that shot, he didn’t recover quick enough.”

Despite promoter Eddie Hearn saying he wishes for Whyte to retire now, the heavyweight hasn't yet decided what he plans to do with his boxing career.

As a trainer, McGirt has worked with multiple world champions, including Arturo Gatti, Antonio Tarver, Hasim Rahman, Paulie Malignaggi, Sergey Kovalev, Callum Smith (pictured below) and WBO middleweight champion Janibek Alimkhanuly.