By Scott Gilfoid: WBA World super bantamweight champion Scott Quigg (30-0-2, 22 KOs) will be licking his wounds for the next 6-7 months from his last fight against Hidenori Otake in November.
Quigg, 26, easily defeated the little known fighter, but in the process of beating him, Quigg suffered a hand injury. He’s since had hand surgery to repair tendon problems for his fight hand. The injury is going to take a significant amount of time for Quigg to recover from though, and he’s not expected to be back in the ring until the summer of 2015.
Quigg had been hoping to return to the ring on March 28th in Manchester. That obviously isn’t going to happen now with the hand injury sidelining him.
Quigg needs to step it up in terms of facing recognizable opposition. Since winning the WBA title last year, Quigg has fought Yoandris Salinas, Diego Oscar Silva, Tshifhiwa Munyai, Stephane Jamoye and Otake. In the meantime, super bantamweight champions Guillermo Rigondeaux and Leo Santa Cruz have both shown interest in fighting Quigg.
Rigondeaux is reportedly trying to get the World Boxing Association to order a fight between him and Quigg, but thus far the WBA hasn’t granted his request. A fight between Rigondeaux and Quigg would give Quigg his first really high quality opponent, but it doesn’t look like that fight is going to happen anytime soon. It would be interesting to see if Quigg takes the fight if the WBA orders it or if he simply vacates in order to protect his unbeaten record from what would likely be a one-sided loss.
“Obviously it’s disappointing not to be able to fight on March 28,” Quigg said. “But I’ve had a great run of five fights in 18 months, four of them being world title fights. The rest will probably do my body good and then I will be looking to come back with a huge fight in early summer.”
Even if Quigg doesn’t face Rigondeaux or Santa Cruz, it would be nice to see him step it up a level and fight the likes of Chris Avalos, Kiko Martinez or Luis Rosas. At least those guys are solid fighters and not obscure like the guys that Quigg has been facing since he won the WBA title.
Some boxing fans think that Quigg is merely milking his title against the most beatable opposition rather than challenging himself to face the best. It’s hard to disagree with those fans when you see Quigg fighting the likes of Otake, Jamoye and Munyai instead of the likes of Rigondeux, Martinez, Avalos or Rosas.
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