By Keith Idec
Billy Joe Saunders isn’t quite as eager as he once was to fight Gennady Golovkin after struggling against Artur Akavov.
Saunders’ first fight in nearly a year resulted in an unimpressive unanimous-decision defeat of the Russian southpaw Saturday in Paisley, Scotland. England’s Saunders said he “stunk the place out” out after making the first defense of the WBO middleweight championship he won from Andy Lee (34-3-1, 24 KOs), the Irishman Saunders defeated by majority decision in a 12-rounder last December 19 in Manchester, England.
“I am looking at unification – Golovkin,” Saunders told the Daily Mail of London following Saturday’s victory. “But most definitely, I don’t want to perform like that against the elite. I think I need another fight sharp, and move on to bigger and better.”
The 27-year-old Saunders (24-0, 12 KOs) previously spoke boldly about his desire to challenge Golovkin (36-0, 33 KOs), the Kazakh knockout artist who has dominated competition since he burst on the American boxing scene four years ago. Saunders reportedly was offered $3 million to fight Golovkin earlier this year, though Saunders disputed that claim, stating that he was offered $1.5 million for that middleweight title unification fight.
Whatever he was offered, Saunders settled for a low-profile fight against the unproven Akavov (16-2, 7 KOs), who lost a 12-round unanimous decision to Saunders by the scores of 116-112, 116-113 and 115-113.
The 34-year-old Golovkin is expected to return to the ring March 18 at Madison Square Garden, perhaps against hard-hitting Daniel Jacobs. Negotiations among handlers for Golovkin and Jacobs (32-1, 29 KOs) began early in the fall, but have yet to result in the finalization of a deal.
If Golovkin defeats Jacobs or another opponent in March, his trainer, Abel Sanchez, said last week that the IBF/WBA/WBC middleweight champion would fight again in June in Kazakhstan.
Keith Idec is a senior writer/columnist for BoxingScene.com. He can be reached on Twitter @Idecboxing.
