It is always important to emphasise the importance of mouthpieces in sports, especially since they can help not only preserve your mouth but also potentially protect your head from certain types of impacts.

However, the type of mouthpiece matters as well, with custom-fit sports mouthguards essential to provide comfort, avoid slips, minimise cuts and help keep competitors in a match even if they have experienced some rough contact.

One of the most famous underdog victories in sports history was in part the result of an ill-fitting mouthpiece, which was not only a metaphor for a lack of preparation but also may have directly led to boxer Mike Tyson failing to answer the count of ten in the Tokyo Dome.

Mike Tyson vs Buster Douglas has been discussed and dissected for over 35 years, but the mouthpiece moment is an element of the fight that is perhaps not discussed enough.

The fight was characterised by a lack of preparation; Mike Tyson had apparently gotten to sleep late, and his corner had neglected to bring some of their standard equipment for a fight, such as an enswell to reduce the swelling over his eye during the later rounds.

In the end, his cutman filled a glove with ice water to act as a cold compress, but it proved to be largely ineffective.

By the tenth round, Buster Douglas managed to knock Mike Tyson down, but in doing so, he also managed to knock his mouthpiece out onto the canvas.

This ultimately proved pivotal, as in scenes that have become somewhat infamous, Mr Tyson reached for the mouthguard and tried to put it in his mouth, ultimately trying to put it in backwards and only getting half of it in his mouth before the referee counted to ten and stopped the fight.

It highlighted the importance of having a carefully fitted mouthpiece, as had he had it in place, there is a chance that Mike Tyson could have beaten the count and continued fighting to at least the end of the round.