By Ryan Burton

On April 14th former lightweight champion Terry Flanagan (33-0) will face Maurice Hooker (23-0-3) at the O2 Arena in Greenwich. At stake will be the WBO super lightweight belt that was vacated by Terence Crawford when he decided to move up to the welterweight division.

The 28-year-old Hooker is taking this fight very seriously.  Instead of just sitting around and waiting for it to be finalized, Hooker went out to California last November to stay in shape so that he would be ready to go when the date was announced.

Hooker respects his opponent but isn't very impressed with his resume.  Flanagan won his title in 2015 but doesn't really have a signature win.  Fights against the likes of Jorge Linares and Mikey Garcia were discussed but never came to fruition.  Hooker believes that Flanagan ducked tough challenges.

"Flanagan to me he is afraid to fight. Flanagan picks his opponents. He decides to move up after Terence Crawford moves up in weight. He is underestimating me but he has never fought anybody like me ," Hooker explained.

The Dallas, Texas native is very confident that he will become the new WBO super lightweight champion and insists that after he wins he will fight the best fighters that the division has to offer.

"I take it one fight at a time but I want all the big guys at 140. Mikey Garcia, I want to fight him. The winner out of the Rances (Barthelemy) - Kiryl (Relikh) fight, (Sergey) Lipinets - I want to fight everybody. I want the best. I am not going to be like Terry Flanagan and win the belt and then go hide," Hooker told BoxingScene.com.

Hooker went 2-0 last year while Flanagan only fought once, defeating Peter Petrov via unanimous decision last April.

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