By Allan Fox: Former WBA super middleweight champion Anthony Mundine (45-5, 27 KO’s) has set his sights on a fight against one of the top fighters in boxing in Floyd Mayweather Jr., Saul “Canelo” Alvarez or Miguel Cotto, following Mundine’s 6th round stoppage win over 42-year-old Shane Mosley last Wednesday night at the Allphones Arena, Olympic Park, Sydney, New South Wales, Australia.
While it may have seen as if the 38-year-old Mundine was merely cherry-picking an older fighter to try and get himself in the thick of things at 147 and 154, Mosley was actually highly ranked by the WBC at #5 and WBA at #6 in the 147 lb. division. Mundine’s win, whether people like it or not, puts him among the big names in the sport.
Mundine said to the Sydney Morning Herald “I want to test my skills and boxing ability against the best in the world. I want to take the next step to get to the biggest fish and that’s Floyd.”
Mundine needs victories over the likes of Canelo and Cotto before he can get to a big money fight against Mayweather, because the win over 42-year-old Mosley isn’t going to be quite enough to open the door for a fight against Floyd. What Mundine, #10 WBA, needs to do is to try and get a fight with Cotto or Canelo next. He’s already beaten Canelo’s brother Rigoberto Alvarez two years ago by a 12 round unanimous decision, so that makes it potentially a meaningful fight for Canelo to face Mundine to try and avenge the loss.
There are other options available for Mundine besides Cotto, Canelo and Mawyeather if he’s unable to get one of them to agree to fight him. Mundine can look to fight the winner of the Austin Trout vs. Erislandy Lara fight on December 7th, and see if that can open the doors for fights against Cotto, Canelo and Mayweather. Mundine can also look to fight IBF junior middleweight champion Carlos Molina or the new WBO champion Demetrius Andrade.
If he’s unable to get fights against any of them, Mundine needs to target the likes of Sergey Rabchenko, Alfredo Angulo, James Kirkland, Vanes Martirosyan, Jermell Charlo or Glen Tapia. The important thing is Mundine needs to fight recognizable fighters that are still young and not in their 40s like Mosley. That was a good start for Mundine to face Mosley, but he needs to do much better than this if he wants to get a fight against the top fighters in boxing. Mundine will just make himself look silly if he keeps fighting older fighters and calling out the likes of Mayweather, Canelo and Cotto.
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