Scott Quigg eyes Carl Frampton fight after Jamoye triumph

Scott Quigg has won 28 and drawn two of his 30 paid fights

Scott Quigg stopped Belgium's Stephane Jamoye in the third round in Manchester to retain his WBA super-bantamweight title and remain on course for a unification bout against Northern Ireland's Carl Frampton.

Bury fighter Quigg, 25, softened the challenger up with a barrage of body shots in the first two rounds before dropping him with a huge right.

Former European champion Jamoye made it to his feet only for the referee to wave the fight off.

Earlier, Olympic champion Anthony Joshua made it eight early finishes from eight pro fights with a third-round stoppage of Germany's Konstantin Airich.

Bury's Quigg [right] required just three rounds to stop Jamoye on Saturday night

Frampton, 27, called Quigg out after winning the IBF belt from Spain's Kiko Martinez in Belfast last Saturday.

However, Frampton fractured his left hand against Martinez and has a mandatory title defence against American Chris Avalos, meaning a fight against Quigg seemed unlikely to take place until next summer at the earliest.

However, after seeing Quigg dispose of Jamoye, the Bury fighter's promoter Eddie Hearn suggested he could pay Avalos to step aside, as Martinez asked him to do in order to fight Frampton instead.

"Scott Quigg wants this fight and Carl Frampton wants this fight," said Hearn.

"We'll make the call to Frampton's manager Barry McGuigan."

Quigg added: "Carl Frampton is the fight I want next.

"Barry, Eddie, Carl and I should sit down in a room and not come out until it is sorted."

Promotional tensions - Frampton left Hearn last year to put his career in the hands of former featherweight world champion McGuigan - are likely to make negotiations difficult.

The major sticking point is likely to be where the fight takes place, with Frampton preferring his home town of Belfast and Quigg preferring Manchester.

Frampton's last fight took place in a 16,000-seat purpose-built outdoor stadium, because the biggest indoor arena in Northern Ireland, Belfast's Odyssey, only holds 9,000. The Manchester Arena, meanwhile, has a capacity of 20,000.

However, the Manchester Arena was only a quarter full on Saturday, suggesting that if Frampton did choose to box Quigg there, he would have the lion's share of the support, despite theoretically being the away fighter.

Quigg holds an inferior version of the WBA title, with Cuba's Guillermo Rigondeaux the governing body's so-called 'super' champion. Rigondeaux is also the WBO title-holder but has a small following, no television deal and is the man everyone wants to avoid in the division.

Both men are unbeaten as professionals, with Quigg winning 28 and drawing two of his 30 paid fights and Frampton winning all 19 of his encounters.

The 24-year-old Joshua, who won super-heavyweight gold at London 2012, showed his patient side in the first two rounds before flooring his opponent with a signature right cross midway through the third.

Joshua was facing an opponent who had won 21 of his 31 previous paid fights

Airich, who had won 21 of his 31 previous paid fights, received a standing eight count but after Joshua landed with another thunderous right hand the German's corner threw the towel in.

Joshua's next fight is against Russian veteran Denis Bakhtov in London on 11 October.

Also on the undercard, Manchester's Anthony Crolla retained his WBO inter-continental lightweight title after a technical draw with Mexico's Gamaliel Diaz.

An accidental clash of heads at the end of the third round left the challenger with a cut over his right eye and the doctor deemed him unfit to continue.

However, it appeared Diaz had made the decision to quit before the doctor's intervention, in which case Crolla should have been awarded a stoppage.