By Elliot Foster

Jamie McDonnell has confirmed that he will return at a higher weight after surrendering his world title.

The Doncaster man is set to come back after losing his WBA ‘regular’ bantamweight crown to Naoya Inoue on May 25 in Tokyo, Japan.

McDonnell was drilled in just one minute and 52 seconds at the Ota-City General Gymnasium by the former WBC light-flyweight king and ex-WBO super-flyweight champion, 25, exclusively live on Sky Sports in the UK.

After taking a barrage of shots and being stopped by referee Luis Pabon following a long Inoue left-hook to the head which rocked him, ‘Mac’, 32, who slipped to 29-3-1 (13 KOs) in defeat, confirmed that he would be going up.

“I take my hat off to Naoya Inoue, he’s a great champion,” he said post-fight. “He’ll go on to achieve even bigger things.

“I got caught with some big shots and I’ll be moving up from here.”

But on Saturday, while sitting ringside in Newcastle at the Metro Radio Arena to watch his brother Gavin retain the WBC International super-bantamweight title with a points victory over Stuart Hall, McDonnell elaborated on the weight move.

He said: “I’ll be leaving the super-bantamweight division, I think, and moving up to featherweight.

“Hopefully I can go up there, enjoy the last part of my career up at featherweight and target some big fights.”

McDonnell’s fellow Englishman Josh Warrington, from Leeds, holds the IBF belt at the weight after outpointing Lee Selby at Elland Road back in May, while the WBO interim belt is held by Carl Frampton due to full champion Oscar Valdez being out with a jaw injury.

Leo Santa Cruz holds the WBA Super title after his recent defence against then-secondary titlist Abner Mares at the weight and Gary Russell Jr., who retained his belt against Joseph Diaz Jr. last month, is the holder of the WBC crown.

Details regarding the return of McDonnell will be revealed in due course.