By Elisinio Castillo
The president of the World Boxing Council, Mauricio Sulaiman, said on Monday that middleweight contender Sebastian Heiland (28-4-2, 15KOs) of Argentina "deserves the opportunity" to fight for the middleweight crown, although he's not been set down - as of yet - as the mandatory challenger.
Heiland is the number one ranked contender under the WBC.
"Heiland has the full support of the WBC and he is a great guy. His baby was just born and he deserves the opportunity," Sulaiman said.
Heiland knocked out Matthew Macklin in what was deemed as a final eliminator back in November of 2014. His shot at then champion Miguel Cotto never came. Neither did a shot at Saul 'Canelo Alvarez, who beat Cotto for the title last November.
The current champion is Gennady 'GGG' Golovkin, who became the titleholder by default when Canelo vacated the belt.
In a weird twist, Golovkin (36-0, 33KOs) beat Marco Antonio Rubio in October of 2014 and somehow became the mandatory challenger a few months later - jumping over all of the ranked contenders under the WBC. At the time Golovkin was already a world champion of two rival sanctioning bodies, the WBA and IBO.
"We just have to be careful with the situation. As everyone knows, Gennady Golovkin was mandatory challenger for two years before becoming our champion," noted Sulaiman.
Heiland is still not sure when the WBC will actually order his title shot.
"When I beat Matthew Macklin in Ireland in November 2014 with a knockout - it was said to be an eliminator to earn a shot at the WBC middleweight title, so the World Boxing Council put me in the first place position in the rankings and I thought I would be fighting for the belt shortly after that, but that wasn't the case at all," claimed Heiland.
