DiBella thinks Canelo will want Golovkin trilogy match now

By Boxing News - 10/06/2019 - Comments

By Matt Lieberman: Sergiy Derevyanchenko’s promoter Lou DiBella thinks that Saul Canelo Alvarez will now be eager to face Gennadiy ‘GGG’ Golovkin (40-1-1, 35 KOs) in a trilogy fight after watching him struggle to win last Saturday night on DAZN in New York.

It was a great fight between Golovkin and Derevyanchenko. Easily one of the best in 2019. If Canelo and Golovkin never fight again, then the boxing public still has an excellent backup fight in Golovkin-Derevyanchenko.

Canelo Alvarez (52-1-2, 35 KOs) is currently tied up in making history against WBO light heavyweight champion Sergey Kovalev (34-3-1, 29 KOs) on November 2. There’s no telling what Canelo will do after that fight. He says he’s going to move back down to 160, but there’s no guarantee that he’ll fight GGG again.

Fighting in front of a pro-GGG audience at Madison Square Garden last Saturday, Golovkin won a 12 round unanimous decision over the highly motivated Derevanchenko (13-2, 10 KOs).  Golovkin’s fans turned on him at the end, booing loudly after he was announced as the winner.

“Canelo probably licking his chops right now,” said DiBella per Mike Coppinger about a Canelo-Golovkin trilogy match.

Many fans now believe that a third fight between GGG and Canelo would be a slam dunk win for the Golden Boy star. Alvarez is still getting better with every fight, whereas Golovkin is showing that he’s deteriorating a little. It might not even be a fair fight if Canelo takes on Golovkin at this point. Canelo would impress fans more if he were to face Derevyanchenko, the uncrowned champion, then he would Golovkin.

YouTube video

Although Golovkin won the fight, the boxing world as a whole saw it a different way. The result of the fight gave fans the idea that while GGG got the decision, the rematch would see a winner winner. That might be one of the reasons why Golovkin’s promoter Eddie Hearn was talking about wanting to take him in another direction, and not setting up a rematch with Derevyanchenko.

“I had Gennadiy winning the last two rounds to win the fight. It was a very close fight,” said Matchroom Boxing promoter Eddie Hearn to secondsout. “I thought Gennadiy showed so much heart, especially with what he went through this week. And I think it was a mixture of many things. I think Sergiy fought the fight of his career. He got the tactics beautifully from Andre Rozier.

YouTube video

“And he tried to follow the blueprints from the second Canelo fight,” said Hearn about Derevyanchenko fighting Golovkin on the inside. He pushed GGG back. We know that GGG wasn’t 100%, and he battled through it. He came back into the fight. If he’d lost the last two rounds, especially the 12th round, then I would have said that Derevyanchenko deserved to steal the fight himself.  The knockdown in the first round was huge. Obviously, you got a 10-8 round there, and you got the last 2 rounds as well,” said Hearn.

Derevyanchenko wasn’t following the blueprint that Canelo created. He was fighting the way he fought against Daniel Jacobs last October. Derevyanchenko lost a controversial decision in that fight too after getting the better of the ‘Miracle Man’ for the majority of the fight. Like in the Golovkin match, Derevyanchenko was knocked down in the 1st round by Jacobs. Derevyanchenko came back strong, and battered Jacobs in close. Jacobs fought better than Golovkin did against Derevyanchenko.

“As Lou [DiBella] said, ‘I’m not calling it a robbery.’ You can’t get close to calling it a robbery,” said Hearn. If you look at the scores from press row, it’s like 115-114, 114-113 and 114-114, so it’s a very, very close fight. If you look at all three judges, it’s not a case of Gennady has been robbed twice against Canelo, so he deserves this one. But sometimes in a close fight, it doesn’t go your way. Tonight, I saw something where GGG edged the fight, and so did they [judges].

“They’re probably a little bit wide. I had it by one round, but it’s subjective,” said Hearn.

It doesn’t matter what Hearn thinks. The fans are the ones that matter, and they weren’t impressed with Golovkin. He’s got to make a decision now whether to give Derevyanchenko a rematch, and please the fans, or move on and look like he’s ducking the fight.

YouTube video