Castleford fighters Anthony Holmes and Nathan Owens find it tough going at BKFC 55

Former world champion Holmes suffered his second straight defeat when he was beaten by Poland’s Bartlomiej Krol while the less experienced bare knuckle fighter Owens was unable to repeat the success of his first fight in the sport as he lost to fellow Brit Conor Cooke.

Holmes was in the co-main event at middleweight and up against an unbeaten opponent he was not his best, but started the better, landing more punches than Krol in the opening round.

He was edged out in the second, appeared to edge the third, but was outpunched in the fourth round and following it, Holmes’ corner called a stop to the fight with Krol being declared the winner by technical knockout.

After the fight a disappointed Holmes revealed he had been ill in the build-up to the fight.

He said: “I’ve had a brilliant camp, but unfortunately I’ve been struck with illness. We had a conversation with the coach and he said ‘do you want to pull out’? But I said no chance.

"We said take it round by round and kept good communication with the corner team. I thought I won every round, but we thought best to pull me out as my vision and legs weren’t there and I was struggling to breathe every round. I wasn’t hurt throughout the fight.

“We turned up regardless and can hold my head high. I believe in my coaches who have the best interest of my health and wellbeing.

"I’ll take a bit of rest now and be back stronger. These things happen, you can’t be 100 per cent all the time.

"We’ll just take it step by step from here.

"Thank you for all the support, sorry I didn’t get the win but in my eyes I won every round and can’t help the circumstances. I’ll be back when fully right.”

Owens’ fight was at light-heavyweight and he struggled to find his range, missing with many more punches than he landed.

He took some heavy punishment in the second round when Cooke completed an inside the distance win.