By Stevie Ocallaghan: On March 16th at Wembley stadium we can look forward to an outstanding match-up between current WBO lightweight Champion Ricky Burns from Scotland and the Mexican IBF champ Miguel Vazquez.
It’s a good match-up between the two as they both stand 5’10” with Vasquez having the slightly longer reach. Both fighters don’t seam to have 1 punch KO power but Burns has started to show more grit and strength in his last few fights.
Vasquez at 33-3 with 13 stoppages is on a 12 fight win streak, only losing to Saul Alvarez (twice) and Tim Bradley. Two very good fighters. At the same time he has struggled against mediocre opposition against the likes of Quintero and Daniel Attah, nevertheless still won both fights.
Burns at 35-2 with 10 stoppages is on a 20 fight win streak since losing to Carl Johanson in 2009. I have to say Vasquez has lost to better opposition but Burns is vastly improved since then.
If we can try and compare fighters and opponents a few names pop up. Marvin Quintero lost against Daniel Attah. Vasquez beat both but Quintero on S/D. Breidis Prescott lost on a S/D to Vazquez but Prescott lost to Paul Mcloskey and Kevin Mitchell. Burns destroyed Mitchell inside 4 rounds.
Roman Martinez, who lost his super featherweight title to Ricky Burns blew Attah out in six rounds, flooring him 3 times. Martinez has still only lost 1 fight.
I see this fight going the distance as they are both very durable , can take a good shot and are genuine champions. The winner is set to fight to fight WBC champ Adrien Broner in the summer. Broner is arguably no1 in the division but Burns and Vazquez deserve to be belt holders and do not listen to any other USA biased writers who say everybody is ducking Broner.
Here we have a unification bout, nobody is ducking anybody and come the summer whoever wins this bout will hold 2 belts, yes 2 because these 2 fighters are willing to lay it on the line and then Broner will realistically be challenging. If in the summer Broner hold all 3 belts then it’s undeniable but until then judgement is reserved.
On March 16 at Wembley we genuinely have a great bout which will be tight. Even though Vazquez has the longer reach I can see Burns out-muscle Vazquez and take both belts back to Scotland, but it won’t be easy.
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