By William Mackay: The December 11th fight card with Nathan Cleverly, Matthew Macklin, James DeGale, Paul Smith, Kell Brook, Frankie Gavin and Tony Ballew looked good to me at first but I’m not really impressed with the fights that I’m seeing the card thus far. Of the fights that have been confirmed for the card – Paul Smith vs. James DeGale, Frankie Gavin vs. Dean Harrison, Nathan Cleverly vs. Alejandro Lakatos and Matthew Macklin vs. Ruben Varon – those bouts don’t really aren’t all that spectacular to me. I like the DeGale-Smith fight, but that’s about it.

I never heard of Ruben Varon (35-5, 16 KO’s), and given that he’s been already stopped by Sebastian Zbik last year, I think Macklin should be facing better opposition than this. Macklin (27-2, 19 KO’s) is ranked #5 WBC, #5 WBO, and #6 WBA. With that kind of ranking, shouldn’t Macklin be facing better opposition at this point in his career? I havne’t even heard of most of the opponents that Macklin has fought during his nine-year pro career.

Isn’t it time Macklin starts to fight some of the top contenders in the middleweight division instead of another obscure fighter? I’m cool with Macklin padding his record, but I just think he’s going to be in trouble when he finally takes on a top tier fighter for the title. I think it would be better for Macklin to at least fighting some contenders now so that it won’t be such a huge shock when he’s put in with someone like Dmitriy Pirog or Sergio Martinez.

I think Cleverly should be facing a better opponent as well. Lakatos (31-5, 23 KO’s) was beaten three fights ago by Viacheslav Uzelkov. I’d rather see Cleverly facing someone that wasn’t recently beaten. Granted, Lakatos record is somewhat nice but most of his wins have come against obscure fighters in Spain. Instead of facing this guy, why not match Cleverly with someone like Gabriel Campillo, Hugo Garay or Chris Henry? I think Lakatos is too easy of an opponent for Cleverly.

The fights that have been arranged thus far are mostly boring me with the exception of DeGale vs. Smith. All I can say is I hope Brook is matched against a live opponent, preferably someone ranked in the top 10.