By Jason Kim: Last night, it was learned that WBA welterweight champion Shane Mosley (46-5, 39 KO’s) would be defending his title against Joshua Clottey (35-3, 20 KO’s) on December 26th, at the Staples Center, in Los Angeles, California. Although this isn’t the fight that Mosley, 37, wanted to get, it’s still great news that Shane is fighting an opponent is excellent as Clottey, who is one of the top five fighters in the welterweight division at this point in time.

Mosley would have preferred to get a fight against Manny Pacquiao, Floyd Mayweather, Miguel Cotto, Andre Berto, Ricky Hatton or Juan Manuel Marquez, but those fighters weren’t looking to fight Mosley. Out of action since January, Mosley badly needed an opponent to fight because he had wasted most of this year fruitlessly attempting to get a fight against Pacquiao.

In hindsight, Mosley should have given up on the idea of fighting Pacquiao long ago and sought out the best available fighter. The 32-year-old Clottey is, in reality, the best that Mosley can do right now, because the other top welterweights or either tied up with other bouts or flat out just not interested in fighting Mosley.

Knowing this, it’s hard for Mosley not to be bitter about it, because he comes from the old school in which he believes that if you want to be the best, you have to fight the best. Unfortunately for Mosley, not all the other welterweights feel the same way as he does.

Never the less, Clottey remains a good opponent for Mosley and one that boxing fans likely won’t be disappointing in seeing if Clottey fights like he did in his last bout against Miguel Cotto in June. That fight was highly entertaining and if not for Clottey running out of gas in the final rounds, he very likely would have won the fight or at the very least, made it even closer than it turned out to be.

Clottey has fast hands and is especially good at throwing multiple hooks and uppercuts. When he’s putting his punches together, Clottey is very tough because he has good power and his speed makes him much more dangerous.

Clottey is very hard to hit, because he holds his hands high similar to Winky Wright and blocks a lot of the shots thrown at him with his gloves. Due to his speed and power, Clottey might turn out to be a more dangerous opponent for Mosley than Shane’s last opponent Antonio Margarito.

Mosley was able to win that fight thanks to his better hand speed, combinations and strategic clinching. However, Mosley will have a tougher time against Clottey, because he’s a lot faster than Mosley is and is good at throwing short punches with a lot of speed. Clottey is a very tough fighter and won’t be easy to clinch without him tagging Mosley.

In Mosley’s fight against Margarito, Shane used a variation of the punch and grab method of fighting. It was boring to watch at times, but never the less quite effective. If Mosley tries to adopt that same strategy against Clottey, he may be sorry for it because Clottey won’t be beaten to the punch like Margarito and is much better at throwing flurries than Mosley at this point in Shane’s career.

By the time that Mosley ends up fighting Clottey in December, it will have been nearly a year since Mosley last fought. There’s a question whether Mosley will be the same fighter he was with that much off. That’s not a lot of time for most fighters, but for a fighter that is 37, and about to turn 38, that’s a long time.