By Mark Vester
On Wednesday, former champion Anthony Mundine spoke to Australian reporters about last week's five round knockout loss to Garth Wood. It marked the second KO loss of Mundine's career and the first defeat since 2005. Mundine is now pushing for a rematch. He claims the loss brought his hunger back and now he aims to get revenge.
"I've already got that hunger back, you know that," Mundine said. "We're chasing that rematch but if that don't come together for some reason, we're going to go on and achieve what I've set out to achieve and become the junior middleweight champion of the world. Things happen in boxing. I still feel I'm the superior fighter, probably most people do and still can't believe it, they're in shock.
"But I'm a guy that, I'm a fatalist, I believe in fate, I believe in will and destiny and I feel that that happened for a reason. Maybe to kick me up the bum, get that hunger back, get that eye of the tiger back that I had when I first came into the sport.
Prior to the loss, Mundine was already looking ahead to a possible move to the United States. He wants to target the biggest names at 154-pounds, but now the first piece of his plan has been changed.
"I was sort of in cruise control I think the last couple of years but now I'm going to treat every fight like it's my last. I hope we get the rematch but if we don't we've got to move on," Mundine said.
"Obviously I had a setback which I wasn't anticipating but I wasn't going to the States until mid-year next year anyway because I wanted to have that fight and I wanted to get the junior middleweight title and then go. Depending on how things pan out over the next couple of weeks with the rematch we're still on schedule to do what I want to do and probably go there."
