By Rick Reeno

BoxingScene.com was advised that Ahmet Oner, CEO of Arena Box, is seriously considering Rogers Mtagwa as the next opponent for WBA "regular" featherweight champion Yuriorkis Gamboa. Last Saturday in New York, Mtagwa came close to putting away unbeaten Juan Manuel Lopez in a thriling twelve round contest. Lopez managed to hang on in the championship rounds to win a unanimous decision. Gamboa appeared in the co-feature, knocking out Whyber Garcia in four rounds.

Top Rank and Oner are promotional partners on Gamboa. They want to match him against Lopez in the summer of 2010. Lopez is scheduled to make his HBO return on January 23 in Puerto Rico. The frontrunner to fight Lopez is WBO featherweight champion Steven Luevano, who is also under contract with Top Rank. Gamboa is likely going to appear in the co-feature to further build his clash with Lopez. Mtagwa, even at featherweight, would be a dangerous fight for Gamboa. If Gamboa puts on a better showing, or even stops Mtagwa, it would make quite a statement to the media, and more importantly the bigwigs at HBO.