By Miguel Rivera

Unbeaten light heavyweight contender Eleider Alvarez does not expect WBC world champion Adonis Stevenson (29-1-1, 24 KOs) to continue fighting for much longer.

Stevenson, 40 years old, has averaged one fight per year since 2015.

He returned to the ring last month in Toronto, and nearly got derailed in a twelve round majority draw with Badou Jack.

Alvarez was the mandatory challenger to Stevenson since the fall of 2015.

After years of waiting, Alvarez decided to finalize a deal to fight WBO light heavyweight champion Sergey Kovalev on August 4th in Atlantic City.

After watching the contest between Stevenson and Jack, Alvarez believes the WBC champion is at the end of his career.

"Honestly, I think Stevenson will have two fights left and after that he will make his retirement. We hope that before those two fights I will have the opportunity, after I'm victorious against Sergey Kovalev, because that is my idea. As difficult as that will be, because we are going to face two great fighters... if that fight with Adonis comes up, I welcome it," Alvarez said to ESPN Deportes.

Alvarez and Stevenson are both promoted by Yvon Michel of GYM, and they share the same adviser in Al Haymon. But for whatever reason they were never able to reach an agreement to fight each other.

"With Adonis, we do not have a relationship as friends or anything that looks like that... just a 'hello, how are you,' normal stuff and it should be like that. Sometimes boxing is business, he has always looked at it that way and always denied me the chance to fight for the world title - but there was never any closeness between us. With Jean Pascal, I have a better relationship with him because we spent five years training together. We do not call each other every day, but every so often we talk."