One of the biggest bouts of the boxing calendar year goes down on the weekend. This is going to be a massive battle as well between Gennady Golovkin and Saul ‘Canelo’ Alvarez. There has long been huge public demand for this fight, but it never really looked as if it was going to happen. But the two fighters have risen to the occasion to put themselves on the line and this should be a classic. This is happening in Las Vegas at the T-Mobile Arena, the scene of the recent Floyd Mayweather v Conor McGregor duel.
Golovkin goes into this with the WBA, WBC and IBF Middleweight titles. Of the three, if Golovkin were to lose, the WBC title would become vacant. It has been a huge year for boxing and this one is right up there as one of the best. Golovkin has remained something special throughout his career and the 35 year old goes into this defending his 37 match unbeaten record during his career. It was only back in May after Canelo had beaten Julio Cesar Chavez Jr that GGG stepped into the ring to announce that he would take on Alvarez.
GGG v Canelo Alvarez Boxing Odds
Golovkin 4/6, Alvarez 5/4 at Coral
Naturally because of all the hype around the Mayweather v McGregor farce, this one hasn’t quite achieved as much hype. But this should be some fight and it will determine just which of them is the best fighter in the world at the moment. GGG will go into his 20th consecutive world title fight so there is no messing around from him. His record stands at 33 knockouts from his 37 bouts. The question is now, is he at his very best because there have been signs of vulnerability creeping in later into his career.
When GGG fought Kell Brook, who had come up two weight divisions to face the champion, Brook landed some nice blows in the fight before he was stopped. Then back in March, it looked as if Golovkin’s unbeaten record may have come to an end as Daniel Jacobs became the first man to last the distance with Golovkin in a championship fight but the unanimous decision went to GGG. Some ridiculous rumours have come out that the Kazakh fighter deliberately didn’t go all out in the bout against Jacobs to lure Alvarez into fighting him.
27 year old Alvarez has a 49-1-1 career record and from that, 34 have been knockouts. That was that big bout for him back in May against Chavez, which turned out to be a non-contest really because Alvarez dominated the entire proceedings. It was expected to be a much closer fight, but the class of Canelo was total and he produced such a smart display of tactical boxing. You see that loss on his record, well that’s not anything to be overly concerned about because that happened against Floyd Mayweather back in 2013.
GGG v Canelo Alvarez Boxing Prediction
Golovkin has been a beast in his career, but he is getting to the end of it. If you base things off of their respective last fights, then Canelo gets the nod for us. Golovkin was simply struggling against Jacobs earlier in the year because his opponent got inside his jab and worked the Kazakh very well. Canelo managed a big guy in the form of Chavez in his last fight and never looked to be troubled. The defence of GGG will all be on his jab but if the Mexican get inside of that, it will probably be game over. One weakness of Canelo is his footwork so he has to avoid that jab at all costs. Otherwise he is tactically sound and and can become the unified middleweight champion of the world.
It is rare that you will find a fight so evenly matched in the betting market. Golovkin is at 4/6 with bookmaker Coral and Alvarez is at 5/4. So not a big margin there but the Mexican gets it and this has a strong probability of going all the way to points and Alvarez is a 2/1 punt to claim this on points.
