By Edward Chaykovsky

WBO junior middleweight champion Liam Smith is preparing to defend his title against Mexican superstar Saul 'Canelo' Alvarez on September 17th at AT&T Stadium in Arlington, Texas.

A lot of fans, and critics, have attacked the match because they want Canelo to face IBF/WBC/IBO/WBA middleweight champion Gennady 'GGG' Golovkin.

Golovkin was the mandatory challenger to Canelo's WBC title. Canelo had vowed to face him in the ring, but then vacated the belt and moved down to face Smith. The sanctioning body made Golovkin the champion by default.

Smith recently held a question and answer chat on Reddit and gave his opinion on the Canelo vs. Golovkin situation. He feels Canelo ducked Golovkin and went about the situation in the wrong way.

"Ducked him massively. He went the wrong way about it. He know he's being criticized a lot and losing a lot of fans about the way he did it. If he was open and honest about it people would have understood. If he said 'look at the moment I'm not 160 [and] GGG wouldn't come down.' If he said 'look I'll fight you in 12 months time, I'm going to build myself to 160 and he'd have bought himself grace,'" Smith stated.

"But the way he went about it after the fight with Cotto he got Triple G in the ring and said he'd put the gloves back on. Then after the fight he said he the thing about his balls, he built the fans up about fighting him next and then he gave the belt up. I just think he went about it the wrong way."

Smith is a little upset that Canelo and his team are even mentioning possible opponents like Golovkin and he was stunned with Canelo's recent comment that he'd 'love a fight with Manny Pacquiao.' He is confident that Canelo's next fight will be a rematch, because it's going to be a shocker next month.

"Obviously when I beat Canelo, the next fight would be a rematch. I'll beat Canelo and they're going to offer as much money as they want to put the record straight and come up with every excuse in the book. You know I've just told people on [social media] he's saying he'd love to fight Pacquiao. If they're talking about Canelo-Pacquiao - They're gonna be very embarrassed when I beat them in September," Smith said.

"No because I'm not gonna kid the public like Canelo and say yeah I'll fight GGG because that's where he let himself down because he said 'yes I'll fight you now.' But when I beat Canelo I'm still only a 154 pounder. I'll fight GGG when and if I decide to go to 160. For the time I'm a 154 and not big enough for 160 at the moment."