FORMER undisputed light welterweight boxing champion Josh Taylor has vowed to take time away from the sport before considering his next move.

The Prestonpans fighter went 12 gruelling rounds with Jack Catterall in Leeds on Saturday night before losing out to a controversial judges’ decision.

A third fight between Catterall – who lost a controversial decision in the first bout between the duo – and Taylor has not been ruled out.

However, Taylor told Courier Sport on Tuesday that he was going to take some time away before deciding what the future holds.

He said: “I’m going to take a couple of weeks off for the family.

“This is the first interview I have done – I am not talking to the media. I am just going to take a couple of weeks off to readjust, re-evaluate and spend some time with the family.

“I am a bit sickened by the decision, to be fair. I have been away training for a long time in preparation and I am just going to sit at home, catch up with some family and switch off.”

Thirty-three-year-old Taylor has enjoyed a meteoric rise to the top of the sport after turning professional in 2015.

A former Commonwealth Games gold medal winner at the international competition in Glasgow 10 years ago, he won his first title when he stopped Dave Ryan to claim the Commonwealth light-welterweight title just 16 months after his first professional bout.

He would go on to defeat Ivan Baranchyk and Regis Prograis to lift the IBF and WBA (Super) light-welterweight crowns and win the World Boxing Super Series.

Then, he defeated fellow double world champion Jose Ramirez to win the WBC and WBO light-welterweight belts and unify the division.

Taylor said he had “completed boxing in a sense” as he became only the sixth man to unify a division in the four-belt era.

However, he stressed there was “definitely more in the tank”.

Taylor, who went into the Catterall rematch on the back of a defeat to two-weight division champion Teofimo Lopez, outlined his frustration at the judges’ scoring at the First Direct Arena.

The bout was scored 117-111, 117-111, 116-113 in Catterall’s favour.

Taylor felt the noise surrounding the scorecards in the first fight – many pundits thought Catterall had done enough to win in Glasgow – had had a bearing on the judges’ decision-making on Saturday night.

He thought he had done enough to edge the Leeds bout and said: “I thought I had won by two or three rounds.

“That was the feeling as well with people coming up to me and saying they had me winning by a couple of rounds. But it is what it is.”

And mocking comments made by Catterall’s MP, who complained to the police about the scoring in the first fight, he added: “I’m not going to cry over spilled milk or getting my local MP to write me a letter to the Houses of Parliament.

“I will take my scratches and black eye and move on forward.”