Canelo Alvarez and Terence Crawford are less than two months away from their monumental clash.
‘Bud’ Crawford will make his first appearance at 168lbs when he faces Canelo, having spent the most recent years of his career campaigning at welterweight before he made a brief appearance at super welterweight last August when he outpointed Israil Madrimov.
Canelo has been a dominant force at super middleweight since making the move from 160lbs seven years ago, defeating the likes of Jermell Charlo, Callum Smith and Gennady Golovkin, becoming a two-time undisputed champion in the process.
In an interview with Sean Zittel, female pound-for-pound star Claressa Shields made no mistake in backing Crawford to get the job done against the Mexican icon.
“I think the last few fights I’ve seen Canelo slow down a little bit … Team Crawford, me. It’s gonna be a good one, but Canelo, he’s number two pound-for-pound. Pound-for-pound number one is Crawford, and that’s skill wise.”
Shields followed this up by addressing the concerns surrounding the weight difference between Crawford and Canelo where she touches on her own experiences in moving between divisions.
“Oh that’s beautiful. I’m all the way a heavyweight. That’s because I got the skills, the power and everything to pay the bills. Terence Crawford’s got the skills to pay the bills, the knockout power. He’s very smart in there. And he’s sturdy. Now the weight class can matter a little bit, but boxing matters.”
The stakes couldn’t be higher for Crawford, as victory for the 37-year-old would see him become the first fighter ever modern day male fighter to win an undisputed championship in three divisions, having already achieved this at super-lightweight and welterweight respectively. Shields has accomplished the feat in the super welterweight, middleweight and heavyweight.
