By Dan Ambrose: WBA World middleweight champion Gennady Golovkin (24-0, 21 KO’s) will be defending his title against unbeaten IBO super middleweight champion Thomas Oosthuizen (20-0, 13 KO’s) on January 19th, at New York’s Madison Square Garden, according to goldengloves.co.za.

Golovkin, 30, was hoping to fight World Boxing Association Super World middleweight champion Daniel Geale next, but Geale instead chose to fight Australian Anthony Mundine. This in turn led to the WBA quickly stripping Geale of his title. However, Golovkin now has an arguably better opponent in 6’4″ South African Oosthuizen, who has been impressing boxing fans in the United States recently with his wins on Showtime Sports.

This is a far better fight for Golovkin, because Oosthuizen, #4 IBF, #6 WBC, #11 WBA, is better known in the U.S among casual boxing fans because Geale has spent most of his career fighting in Australia and casual fans don’t have a clue who he is in the U.S.

For the Golovkin-Oosthuizen fight to take place, Oosthuizen has to get by the tough Colombian Fulgencio Zuniga (25-5-1, 22 KO’s) this month on November 10th at the Emperor’s Palace, in Kempton Park, Gauteng, South Africa. This isn’t an easy fight for the 24-year-old Oosthuizen, as Zuniga has good power and he’s a real handful for any fighter in boxing. Zuniga, originally a middleweight, is now fighting at 175. He’s going to be coming down in weight to make this fight happen.

Golovkin recently defeated EBU super middleweight champion Grzegorz Proksa by a 5th round TKO last month. That fight really opened the eyes to a lot of people in the boxing industry about how good Golovkin is. Fans and writers alike had already been aware of Golovkin’s crushing one-punch power from having seen some of his past fights both in the pros and the amateurs. However, many boxing people weren’t aware of how truly good Golovkin was until they saw him decimate a very good Proksa in five rounds.

Oosthuizen has good size and decent power. He’s not someone that’s easy to hit. However, it’s going to be tough for him to try and deal with Golovkin because he doesn’t have the power that Golovkin possesses and he’s not nearly as good an inside fighter. Golovkin will work his way in close and give Oosthuizen a lot of problems in this fight.