By Edward Chaykovsky

WBO middleweight world champion Billy Joe Saunders (24-0, 12KOs) is going to take his time before stepping in the ring with likes of Gennady Golovkin or Saul 'Canelo' Alvarez.

Saunders snapped a near year-long layoff on Saturday night when he won a very lackluster twelve round unanimous decision over Artur Akavov at the Lagoon Leisure Centre in Paisley. The three judges scored it 116-113, 116-112, and 115-113.

Saunders' return was postponed numerous times. Seven months ago he was scheduled to face Max Bursak, but suffered a hand injury and was forced to withdraw. Then he was due to fight on the undercard to Canelo vs. Liam Smith in September, but once again withdrew after rejecting the opponents that were offered.

For nearly a year, Saunders has been calling for fights with Golovkin and Canelo. Now he realizes that a lot more time is needed to get ready for those kind of opponents. The fight was Akavov was Saunders' first since capturing the title from Andy Lee last December.

Saunders was very upset with his performance, which he blamed on the layoff and cutting too much weight too fast.

“Zero out of 10. I felt I won it by about four rounds being kind to myself. I got the win but I have to put it behind me now and come back with a bigger and better performance than that. I put it down to a bit of ring rust, lack of fights and a bit of weight loss, a bit of everything really. It wasn’t there tonight,” Saunders said.

At the recent WBO convention, the sanctioning body ordered him to make back to back mandatory defenses, and he seems receptive to going in that direction.

"Mostly definitely I'll need one if not two [more outings] before a big, big fight. A couple of defenses. I've been ordered to make two mandatories, so I'll get my two mandatories out of the way," Saunders told IFL TV.