Bivol has now defended the WBA gentle-heavyweight belt 11 timesMexican celeb Saul ‘Canelo’ Alvarez suffered a shock factors defeat as Russia’s Dmitry Bivol retained his WBA gentle-heavyweight title in Las Vegas.
Alvarez, 31, is the undisputed world neat-middleweight champion but he stepped up in weight for the bout and was handed a 2nd defeat in 61 bouts.
Bivol, also 31, claimed victory with a unanimous factors resolution take taking his undefeated file to 20 bouts.
All three judges scored the fight 115-113 in Bivol’s favour.
“I’m satisfied I proved myself, I’m one of the tantalizing in my division and I withhold this belt,” acknowledged Bivol. “He’s a astronomical champion, I admire him and all his crew.
“Whereas you invent no longer factor in in yourself what invent you invent? You enact nothing. I factor in and my crew believed in me.
“I felt his energy. You can accept as true with about on my arm, he beat my arm up but no longer my head. That’s better.”
Alvarez is rated as the enviornment’s leading pound-for-pound male boxer.external-link, and his handiest diverse defeat was to Floyd Mayweather at gentle middleweight in 2013.
“You ought to honest catch it, it is boxing,” Alvarez acknowledged of the loss. “He’s a astronomical champion. In most cases in boxing you take and lose and I’m no longer giving excuses. I lost and he received.”
Asked if he wished a rematch he acknowledged: “Yeah, obviously I invent. “This does not halt like this.”
Bivol added: “Let’s discuss a rematch. I wished this fight because I wished to fetch the alternative and I esteem this alternative.
“I’m ready for a rematch, I upright are desperate to be treated as the champion now.”
Bivol has held the WBA gentle-heavyweight title since 2016.
There had been criticism of the WBA’s resolution to allow Bivol to fight thanks to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
Extinct heavyweight champion Wladimir Klitschko advised Radio 5 Dwell “it will be principal that this boxer [Bivol] is forbidden from combating in The United States, upright as all Russian athletes are being banned from world opponents”.
Boxing’s world governing our bodies – the WBC, WBO and IBF – responded to Russia’s war in a joint observation that committed to blockading “championship fights inviting boxers from Russia and Belarus”.
However the WBA didn’t effort a the same penalty.