Cleverly Targets Bernard Hopkins Directly After Krasniqi

By Edward Chaykovsky

WBO light heavyweight champion Nathan Cleverly (25-0, 12 KOs) is hoping to get a crack at Bernard Hopkins (52-6-2, 32 KOs), who may face IBF light heavyweight champion Tavoris Cloud (24-0, 19 KOs) on March 9th at Barclays Center in Brooklyn, New York. Cleverly will make a mandatory defense against Robin Krasniqi (38-2, 14KOs) on March 16th, but then he wants a shot at Hopkins.

“Hopkins has jumped to the top of the list, he’s the fight I want,” Cleverly said.

Cleverly realizes that a single bump in the road against Krasniqi will destroy his dream of facing the Hopkins-Cloud winner.

"I've got to perform and impress against this guy and that's going to set up the rest of 2013 then for the big unification fights... Everything will fall into place after this fight. If it all goes well with the Krasniqi fight, I would definitely like to fight the winner of Hopkins and Tavoris Cloud."

Cleverly was on his way to facing Hopkins when he fought in the United States in November with an eight round TKO of Shawn Hawk in Los Angeles - but then the WBO ordered him to fight Krasniqi within 90 days.