Canelo Alvarez, the world middleweight champion, jumps two weight classes to challenge WBO light-heavyweight champion, Sergey Kovalev, in a Las Vegas 12-rounder bursting with intrigue.
But Canelo – the sport’s biggest star who’s no stranger to having this his own way in the boxing world – will have weighed up the risk vs reward scale carefully before opting for what on the surface, and to the untrained eye, would appear a highly audacious move.
The History
Not so long ago the Russian was one of the most feared fighters in the sport. But Kovalev, at 36, is not the force he was a few years ago nor is he regarded as the best fighter in his division. Three losses (two to Andre Ward and one to Eleider Alvarez) in the space of two years suggested a decline but he has found some decent form over the last 12 months: He gained impressive revenge over Alvarez and also defeated Britain’s Anthony Yarde as recently as August…
