By Dan Ambrose: IBF middleweight champion Daniel Geale’s team are saying that they don’t have a fight signed between Geale and his mandatory challenger Sam Soliman (43-11, 17 KO’s) yet, despite claims by Soliman that they do have a fight coming up.
Soliman defeated former WBA Super World middleweight champion Felix Sturm last Friday night to lock himself in as the mandatory challenger for Geale. However, Geale reportedly is interested in taking an optional title defense before he faces Soliman. Geale’s team could ask the International Boxing Federation for permission to bypass Soliman for one fight to fight someone else.
Soliman said to SEN radio “Having the title gives you leverage to negotiate other fights so how will he get a shot at them if he relinquishes. He [Geale] won’t have any leverage, he won’t have anything to put on the table. It’s a no-brainer and not only that, how bad would it be for him when the whole world wants to see us.”
Soliman is misjudging the interest in a Geale vs. Soliman fight. There might be interest from boxing fans in Australia, but that’s pretty much it. Soliman isn’t well known outside of Australia except for with hardcore boxing fans, and that’s the same for Geale. Geale-Soliman would be strictly for domestic consumption only, and the rest of the world will survive quite nicely if that fight never gets made.
Geale did a really good job of beating 37-year-old Anthony Mundine last month by a 12 round unanimous decision by the scores of 116-112, 117-111, and 117-111. That was another domestic fight that Australians wanted to see, whereas the rest of the boxing world weren’t too excited about it.
Mundine has been out of the picture for ages in terms of the world scene, so the fight failed to gather much interest outside of Australia.
Geale would do himself a huge favor if he fought someone relevant like WBA World middleweight champion Gennady Golovkin so fans could see a good fight. Soliman will still be there for Geale even if Geale gets knocked out by Golovkin. A Soliman-Geale fight is one that the Australians would like even if there’s no title on the line.
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