Shakur Stevenson is undoubtedly one of the most skilled fighters in the game but with that brings its difficulties finding suitable opponents.
The WBC lightweight champion applies the old boxing adage of ‘hit and don’t get hit’ and, although that delivers results, it doesn’t necessarily bring commercial value, making it hard for him to lure the top fighters into the ring.
After talks seemingly failed with WBA Champion William Zepeda, Stevenson was yet again looking for his next opponent and, according to Turki Alalshikh, that man will most likely be former super-featherweight champion Joe Cordina.
Asked by Charlie Parsons in a recent interview about the fight, the Riyadh Season head honcho said it’s ‘close.’
“I think we are close to doing this.”
The Welshman has made it clear about his difficulties making the 130lb limit and has now seemingly decided to move up to lightweight.
Talking to The Stomping Ground about the 135 division, Cordina put the top fighters into categories.
“I’ll put them in different categories, I think the easiest is Berinchyk, the most difficult is Loma and Gervonta, actually the most difficult is Loma, the most money is Gervonta and then you have Shakur who would be the most technical.”
He then stated Shakur was his number one choice and he rates him as a top pound-for-pound fighter.
“Obviously they’re all great in their own right, but if I had to choose one to face, just because he was at super-featherweight also and after I won and world title he called me out, would be Shakur. I respect him, I think he’s a great fighter, I’m a fan and I do rate him, but I’d love that fight. You only become great when you beat great fighters, to be the best you have to beat the best and for me he’s in the top 5 pound-for-pound fighters in the world.
You now what yanks are like, they talk s**t. I’ll be honest they all think they’re gagsters, which is mad. They all talk, they’re all great talkers and they can all sell a fight. They are just so brash, it’s crazy. We had a little back and forth on social media, he didn’t say too much, he wasn’t really disrespectful and neither was I.”
Stevenson vs Cordina could land on the Oleksandr Usyk vs Tyson Fury rematch card on December 21.
