Geale Angry After Being Stripped Of WBA Crown

Daniel Geale has voiced his frustration at being stripped of one of his two world middleweight titles. At the annual WBA Convention in Jakarta the organization stripped Geale of the title for opting to fight fellow Australian Anthony Mundine instead of its ‘regular’ middleweight champion Gennady Golovkin of Kazakhstan.

The 31 year-old Geale,28-1-(15), who also holds the IBF version of the title, won the WBA crown by defeating long time champion Felix Sturm via 12 round split decision back in September and is understandably frustrated at being stripped of the title after just two months.

’’We found it frustrating that because of Felix Sturm not fighting his mandatory for so long that the WBA put their ruling on us and they gave us half the amount of time that you usually get to have the mandatory,’’ Geale told the Sydney Morning Herald on Friday.

’’They enforced what Felix Sturm hasn’t done on to me, which is definitely unfair.

’’I have had the title now for two months, I still haven’t received my belt in the mail and they’ve stripped me of the title.

’’So, as you can expect, we’re angry and frustrated and annoyed by that.’’

Geale was in a no win situation because the IBF granted him an extension to his mandatory defence so he could face Mundine in a big money all Australian clash before facing another Australian, Sam Soliman, who is the mandatory contender for the IBF crown.

’’We basically knew whichever direction we went unfortunately we weren’t going to be able to retain both titles,’’ added Geale . ’’At some stages, we were of the opinion that it was going to be OK [with the WBA] that I was going to fight Golovkin, not when they made me, but we definitely are going to fight him.’’

November 2, 2012