Paulie Malignaggi has backed a newly-crowned world champion to defeat Mexican great Canelo Alvarez in a potential future clash.
Canelo was last in action back in September when he suffered a shock unanimous decision defeat to the now retired Terence ‘Bud’ Crawford at the Allegiant Stadium in Las Vegas, Nevada.
Crawford put on an outstanding display against the Mexican superstar to dethrone him of his undisputed super-middleweight championship and become the first fighter of the ‘four belt era’ to achieve this feat in three separate divisions.
Whilst it had been suggested that Canelo was considering retirement following his loss to ‘Bud’, the 35-year-old from Guadalajara has vowed to fight on and is set to make his return to the ring by September of this year.
Speaking to ProBox TV, Malignaggi admitted that he does not believe Canelo has what it takes to defeat the newly-crowned WBC super-middleweight champion Christian Mbilli, who has been linked with the Mexican icon over the last couple of months.
“Point number one, he would fight him if it’s a getting up off the canvas win or something like that, where he looks susceptible against him, he would. Number two, I don’t know if the fight happens anyway because I’m not sure Canelo beats Mbilli.
“Mbilli’s pace I think is going to bother Canelo a lot. Now, champ makes a good point yesterday when he said the power of Canelo may offset that pace but I’m not sure.
“Mbilli’s a pretty stubborn guy, and Lester has a good amount of power and he wasn’t able to dissuade the pace of Mbilli so I’m not convinced Canelo even gets to Mbilli unless it’s a robbery of course.”
Mbilli has emerged as one of the best active super-middleweights on the planet over the last 12 to 18 months which began with breakout wins over Sergiy Derevyanchenko and Maciej Sulecki.
The 30-year-old Cameroonian was last in action on the undercard of Canelo’s defeat to Crawford when he fought to a split draw to Lester Martinez to retain his WBC interim title at 168lbs.
He has since been elevated to full world champion however after ‘Bud’ opted to vacate the title prior to his retirement from the sport in December.
