By Francisco Salazar
Junior featherweight contender Jessie Magdaleno will fight Raul Hirales on May 1, Top Rank matchmaker Brad Goodman told BoxingScene.com on Monday night. The eight round bout will take place inside the Chelsea Ballroom inside The Cosmopolitan in Las Vegas, Nev.
The Magdaleno-Hirales bout will be on the non-televised portion of the Top Rank card.
Magdaleno (20-0, 15 KOs) was scheduled to fight John Mark Apolinario on April 11 in Laredo, Texas. The Texas Commission did not approve a license for Apolinario due to a pre-existing medical condition.
The 23 year old Magdaleno last fought on January 10, winning an eight round unanimous decision over prospect Erik Ruiz. Magdaleno resides in Las Vegas, but trains in Indio, Calif. with trainer Joel Diaz.
Hirales (22-4-1, 11 KOs) has lost back-to-back unanimous decisions to Luis Melendez of Colombia and to Albert Pagara of the Philippines.
Tru TV will televise the vacant WBO world lightweight title bout between Ray Beltran (29-7-1, 17 KOs) and Takahiro Ao (27-3-1, 12 KOs) and the unbeaten welterweight clash between Mikael Zewski (26-0, 20 KOs) and Konstantin Ponomarev (27-0, 13 KOs).
Francisco A. Salazar has written for Boxingscene.com since September of 2012 and has covered boxing in Southern California and abroad since 2000. Salazar also covers boxing for the Ventura County (CA)
Star newspaper, RingTV, and Knockout Nation. He can be reached by email at santio89@yahoo.com or on Twitter at FSalazarBoxing
