By William Mackay: It looks like Paul McCloskey (23-1, 12 KO’s) is going to have to wait a little while longer before he gets a shot at fighting WBA light welterweight champion Marcos Maidana (31-2, 28 KO’s), as Maidana isn’t pleased with the offer for the fight. McCloskey and his promoter Eddie Hearn of Matchroom Sports, were hoping to fight Maidana in Ireland in February in front of a large crowd.

Maidana, a fearless fighter, was open to fighting McCloskey in Northern Ireland, even though McCloskey recently beat Breidis Prescott by a controversial 12 round decision Belfast, Northern Ireland last month. Maidana didn’t seem to mind that and was willing to take his chances that he would knock McCloskey out before the final bell to take the decision making away from the judges.

However, Maidana wasn’t pleased with the financial offer from McCloskey’s promoter, and so he’s moving on according to Irish-boxing.com. Maidana has better options fighting in the United States for bigger purses and he’s not going to put himself in a situation where he’s fighting on the challenger’s home country and not getting the money he feels he deserves.

I can’t blame Maidana for moving on. It’s not worth taking the small money to have to fight in your challenger’s home town, especially after the challenger won a controversial decision there. I saw the Prescott-McCloskey fight I only gave McCloskey a couple of rounds at best. No way did he win that fight. The pro-McCloskey crowd was cheering his every miss and believe me, McCloskey was missing a lot in the second half of the fight and eating constant jabs. He did look to have the more energy, but he was missing and eating jabs. You can’t give a guy rounds for eating jabs and missing. McCloskey did zero in the first half of the fight and was knocked down in the 1st round. It was a terrible decision and you got to feel for Prescott.

I personally would like to see McCloskey and Maidana fight, but only if the fight takes place in a neutral venue like the United States. Letting McCloskey fight at home against a champion like Maidana is just asking for trouble.