Sugar Ray Robinson was again the new middleweight champion. Zigzagging all over Europe, Sugar Ray defended his title six times in the space of forty days. His final defense was against a little known Englishman by the name of Randolph Turpin.

At the time Turpin was the current British and European middleweight tittles with a peculiar but effective boxing style. He used a wide-legged stance, pulling back from the waist to avoid punches rather than ducking inside them,and leading off with a good left jab. Despite his high standing amongst the British fans, few of the boxing writers gave Turpin much of a change against Sugar Ray Robinson.

At the weigh-in Turpin impressed Sugar Ray with his build especially his upper torso. Ray later described Turpin's upper body like an oak tree. Turpin's well developed upper torso was due to weight-training, at a time when this form of exercise was not considered beneficial to boxers because it was thought to make them muscle-bound rather than supple.

Surrounding the ring at Earl's court was a capacity crowd of 18 000 who had paid £80 000, which was the equivalent of $224 000 dollars; a British record for its time.

From the first round through to the sixth, Turpin managed to dominate especially in the clinch. But in the seventh, Turpin 's forehead smacked against Ray's left eyebrow, which caused it to bleed. Turpin went on to out punch and to out work Sugar Ray for the rest of the fight and got a referee's decision.