Alex Avogadro has suffered one of the most gruesome eye injuries ever after his Bellator defeat to Luca Cecchetti.A first-round flying knee was his undoing after the doctor decided that he could no longer carry on in his latest kickboxing clash on Saturday night.On impact, the eye started to bleed immediately and closed up very quickly. Avogadro would have found it impossible to see anything out of it as he, rather astonishingly, continued to fight.The footage is hard to watch. Almost as hard as the impact that the knee landed at the very start of the fight, early on in the first round.Cecchetti moved in after feinting to throw a punch and baited Avogadro into thinking he was going to launch his left knee before he switched to his right at the last second, delivering the cruellest of blows.

Incredibly, the brave fighter didn’t even drop to the floor and even managed to escape two follow-up punches as he proceeded to fall back to rest against the ropes. The Italian carried on for the remainder of the round before returning to his corner.

This was when the doctor told him that he wouldn’t be able to carry on, much to the frustration of Avogadro who, rather foolishly, wanted to carry on fighting.

He was seen explaining to the doctor - as he flashed a torch on his swollen eye – that he was okay and is ready to fight. Had somebody have held up a mirror, he might not have been so adamant.

It meant Cecchetti was awarded a TKO win at the Kickboxing 12 event.

MMA promotion Bellator shared the video on their social media pages, and wrote: "So, you want to be a fighter...?

“Be prepared for a knee to meet face like it did when @LucaCecchetti90 met @Alex.Avogdro88 in the @BellatorKB ring."

To which one user responded claiming that his eye looked more like an ear.

The extent of his injury is yet to be determined, but there is no question that Avogadro has won the respect of all his fellow fighter and fans.