Four-time world champion Carl Froch announced his retirement from boxing yesterday after over a year out of the ring.

Super middleweight Froch, nicknamed The Cobra, twice won the WBC title, as well as taking the WBA and IBF belts, during a highly-successful career.

The 38-year-old Nottingham fighter won 33 of his 35 fights, with 24 of those coming by knock-out.

He defeated arch-rival George Groves in a Wembley Stadium re-match which turned out to be his final fight in May of last year.

Froch said: “I’m incredibly proud of what I have achieved in boxing but now is the right moment to hang up my gloves.

“I have nothing left to prove.

“I’ve got no regrets. I’m not retiring undefeated but in many ways that’s better because I’ve boxed everybody, I’ve faced every challenge.

“So many athletes, not just boxers, don’t get their defining moment. I’ve probably had seven or eight defining moments, but the biggest and best was on the platform of Wembley Stadium in front of 80,000 fans.”

An elbow injury forced Froch out of a planned March 28 fight against Julio Cesar Chavez Jr in Las Vegas.

At the time, Froch posted a photo of his gloves hanging up on social media, sparking suggestions of a possible retirement.