After more than a year out, Canelo returned to the ring against Christian Mbilli this past weekend, and Tony Bellew has now reviewed his performance.
Canelo was last in the ring in September last year when he took on multi-weight undisputed champion Terence Crawford and put all four of the super-middleweight titles on the line. He was roundly outboxed by the unbeaten American and lost on the cards for only the third time in his 68-fight career.
After taking time out to recover and have elbow surgery, he challenged Mblli for his WBC super-middleweight world title and never looked in trouble on his way to a unanimous decision win.
In a post on X, Bellew explained how he thinks the fight went and was full of praise for Alvarez.
“I gave Mbilli 3 rounds the whole fight… Second half the fight he ran out of ideas and couldn’t land cleanly enough or often enough! He basically got old manned out the fight and allowed Canelo to control the fight at his own pace.
Canelo is a counter punching genius who given space and time will always look good.”
Canelo is now 36 but rolled back the years to control the fight on his own terms, on the back foot, with signature counter-punching and rock solid defences.
In the ring after the fight, Canelo gave little away about his next move, instead saying he will take time to rest, but he has previously said he would welcome a rematch with Crawford or Dmitry Bivol, who beat him in 2022, while Jake Paul was quick to jump on social media and call out the Mexican legend.
