Liam Walsh says his world title dream will not be derailed, despite suffering the first defeat of his career.

The Cromer fighter was stopped in the third round by American Gervonta Davis, who went some way to proving that the hype surrounding him has been justified.

Walsh was devastated by the defeat, in front of thousands of his supporters, but insists the show goes on.

“Every Sunday morning me and (brother) Ryan go jogging and we will be back on the trail towards a world title,” he said.

“I wholeheartedly believe I will be a world champion. This is a bit of a kick where it hurts.

“I’ll get all the ‘Liam is not world class’ and ‘Liam is rubbish’, they will all come, and I expect it to and I don’t blame them. Everyone has their opinion and they are entitled to it, but judge me from hereon in. Judge me from now. Now I am at my weakest so to speak.

“Judge me and see what sort of man I am. Everyone is good when it is all going good.”

The IBF super-featherweight belt will be going back to Baltimore with Davis, and while there has been talk of Walsh moving to lightweight, the 31-year-old is happy to continue in the 130lb ranks.

“I am fine with the weight and I felt good in there, I felt strong in there after a couple of rounds,” he said.

“I thought, if we get deep into the fight you are in for hell.

“He was sharp but I expected him to be sharp early.”

Walsh‘s game plan had been to take Davis into the second half of the fight – the only previous time he had gone the distance was over a scheduled six-rounder, with most of his fights ending inside three rounds.

“It was my bad for not stinking the place out for four rounds,” he said. “When I was in there after one round I thought, ‘you are going to get hell later when you slow down and your punches are not there and your formation starts losing’ – I felt so much bigger.

“But psychologically I was too eager to want to trade punches.”

It was not all disappointment for the large numbers of fans who travelled: Ryan Walsh retained his British featherweight title earlier on the card, stopping the durable Northern Irishman Marco McCullough in the 11th round.