By Jake Tiernan: Eddie Hearn is anxious to do a stadium fight between Mauricio Lara and Josh Warrington if the conquered former WBA featherweight champion Leigh Wood opts to delay activating his rematch clause for a second fight against the powerful Mexican warrior following his disappointing seventh round knockout loss last weekend in Nottingham, England.
Wood, 34, hasn’t tipped his hand to say definitely that he’ll take the rematch with Lara immediately, but considering how bad he looked at the end of their fight, he may choose to delay taking the match until later this year.
By delaying, Wood increases the chances of him getting the lucrative Warrington fight, which he would have a great shot of winning, and if he wins that well-paying match, then he can face Lara in a rematch that would also pay extremely well.
Most would agree that Wood was well on his way to winning the Lara fight at the time of the stoppage in the seventh round. As Hearn states, if Wood hadn’t gotten greedy by being too aggressive with his offense, he could have boxed his way to a 12 round decision. Instead, Wood tried to knock Lara out and paid a heavy price for that.
If Wood wins that fight, he can face Michael Conlan in a rematch, and that’s another huge money fight that can further set him up for life.
Warrington will get hometown advantage
With Hearn talking about wanting to place the Lara vs. Warrington trilogy match in a stadium, he can only think of one location for that fight, and that’s back at Headingley, which is where their rematch took place in September 2021.
That would give Warrington (31-2-1, 8 KOs), the recently defeated challenger, the chance to have home advance once again in a fight against Lara (26-2-1, 19 KOs), the newly crowned WBA 126-lb champion.
“If we don’t do the rematch, that’s the only fight we would look to,” Matchroom Boxing promoter Eddie Hearn told The DAZN Boxing Show.
“The first fight was in the bubble [at Wembley Arena in February 2021]; it was just the most thrilling, dramatic, probably the most harrowing moment I’ve witnessed in boxing. No sound, no noise; it was just horrible [for Warrington, with him getting knocked out in nine rounds by Mauricio Lara].
“Then the rematch was a huge event in front of 20,000 at Headingley [in Leeds, England], got cut short with a head clash, so the third fight is a natural fight.
“A big stadium fight, it’s a chance for Josh Warrington to become a three-time world champion which is unusual, but there’s a nice little mix in there,” said Hearn.