By Sean McDaniel: WBO light heavyweight champion Nathan Cleverly (24-0, 11 KO’s) says he wants to defend his title against Tony Bellew (17-1, 11 KO’s) in a rematch for his next title defense.

The 25-year-old Cleverly said on his twitter “Spoke to my promoter this morning. Having asked him to make the Bellew fight. Let’s do this!”

Cleverly defeated Bellew by a controversial 12 round majority decision last year in October. However, the fight more questions than answers about Cleverly’s ability because the fight looked more like a draw than a win. Instead of facing Bellew in a rematch to clear up the controversy, Cleverly moved on and faced fringe contender Tommy Karpency in a fight that Cleverly easily won, but a fight that turned off a lot of boxing fans because it was yet another soft opponent for Cleverly.

He was then scheduled to fight #4 WBO Robin Krasniqi. However, Cleverly pulled out of the fight for health reasons. His promoter was hoping to match him against either Bernard Hopkins or Chad Dawson.

Hopkins was the one that they really wanted, but when he was beaten by Dawson it left Cleverly in a situation where he would receive a ton of criticism if he faced the beaten Hopkins, even if he could get that fight. Dawson has already picked out WBA super middleweight champion Andre Ward for his next fight, and that leaves Cleverly without an opponent.

Bellew is easily the best opponent Cleverly could face unless he wants to finally fight his mandatory contender Dmitry Sukhotsky. That’s a fight that would be equally as dangerous for Cleverly as the Bellew fight, but without the payoff that the Bellew would have because Sukhotsky is from Russia and not the UK like Bellew.

Bellew defeated Danny McIntosh by a stunning 6th round TKO last month on April 27th.