LEE SELBY’S trainer, Tony Borg, feels Carl Frampton can defeat Leo Santa Cruz in Las Vegas this weekend to set up a featherweight unification fight with his charge.
Frampton defends his WBA title at the MGM Grand while IBF champion Selby must fend off the challenge of Jonathan Victor Barros on the undercard.
Borg is aware of how tough a fight Santa Cruz is for Frampton, but he expects the unbeaten 29-year-old to retain his crown.
“I hope Frampton wins, it would make a huge British fight, a proper unification fight and it’d be at a stadium in Northern Ireland or in Wales,” he told Boxing News.
“I think he can win again, but it could be really close. If Santa Cruz wins and it’s all even, it throws a spanner in the works for our fight. So hopefully Frampton wins and there’ll be a polished performance by Selby defending his title against Barros.”
Selby’s career has gone slightly under the radar since he defeated Evgeny Gradovich for the title in 2015, but he is eager to secure big fights at 126lbs – starting with Frampton.
Tall for the weight, Selby could also venture north in the future, if the right fights become available.
“We just keep him at a sensible weight, his fighting weight is different. He’s only on the scales for 30 seconds, so that’s not his fighting weight, there’s no point boiling him down to that weight and have him stay there, feeling like s***. We’ve got it all done properly,” Borg said.
“At the moment the big fights are at featherweight. He wants to make his mark on the division, unify the titles and if they’re bigger fights at super-featherweight he’ll move there. He’s big enough to move to lightweight. He’ll have big fights at featherweight, move up and have some big fights at super-featherweight and he might eventually move up to lightweight. It’s a young man’s game, so we’ll see.”
