By Luke Furman

According to promoter Yvon Michel, the long-awaited fight between Adonis Stevenson and Eleider Alvarez will take place, but he still doesn't know when the match will materialize.

"It will happen, but I do not know when," Michel said in an interview with TVA Sports. "Eleider will fight for the world championship in 2018, I can assure you."

Alvarez has been the mandatory challenger to Stevenson's WBC light heavyweight title since the fall of 2015. Stevenson has not made a mandatory defense since 2013, when he knocked out Tony Bellew.

It was announced on Wednesday that Stevenson would defend his title against former world champion Badou Jack on May 19th in Canada, and Alvarez will appear on the undercard in the co-featured slot.

Michel, who promotes both Stevenson and Alvarez, explains that Showtime was very interested in Stevenson-Jack, but not as interested in Stevenson-Alvarez.

He says Alvarez is actually making more money in this current scenario.

"We take good care of Alvarez. He is happy in his situation. Adonis is too. If Eleider had said that he absolutely wants this fight [against Stevenson], we would have done it, but without American television and only using our resources -  the boxers would have had corresponding purses," Michel said.

"We went with logic to protect Eleider, both financially and for the development of his career. His team understood that and decided to go in this direction. I have to sit down with Alvarez's coach and his manager to determine [the opponent].

"Showtime has asked us to find a quality opponent, because it is possible that the fight will be presented on Showtime. Eleider will be part of the Stevenson-Jack card and will make more money than the purse he would have had by fighting with Adonis with all of the risks that I explained earlier."

Luke Furman covers boxing for bokser.org