Saul Canelo vs Rocky Fielding

[p4pking]

I’d like to see Canelos ancestry.com results. If he’s Mexican I’m from Papa New Guinea. What a weird looking guy.

[Gandalf]

Disgusting that this thread is a sticky. I encourage all to boycott this fight.

[Spicoli]

Never wanted an upset more but sadly it's a showcase that is already overlooked with Oscar babbling about his next open fight date. Actually some good names in action this card but majority matched pretty safe. Why is it DAZN cannot advertise accurate start times??

[Master]

Alvarez v Fielding: Briton ready to seize chance against Mexican legend

Late last year, finding himself alongside boxing legend Saul 'Canelo' Alvarez at an event in Belfast, British fighter Rocky Fielding took the opportunity to grab a selfie with the Mexican great.
A few months later, while on holiday in Alvarez's homeland, Fielding was able to wow the locals with his snap of himself alongside their national hero.

One man was taken aback enough to offer Fielding his car for the day, allowing him to take his young son Ralphi to a water park.

Scroll forward a few more months and Fielding - brought up in one of Britain's most deprived areas - now fights 28-year-old Alvarez - the highest paid man in boxing with Floyd Mayweather having retired - at New York's Madison Square Garden in New York on Saturday.

It is a landmark night in the career of a 31-year-old who caught a double-decker bus home to Stockbridge Village in Merseyside with his handful of supporters after a debut fight at Salford Sports Centre eight years ago.

"I beat him and I wake up the king of New York on the Sunday, the next face of boxing," Fielding told BBC Sport. "I'm not sure I'll be able to go back to Mexico though."

Fielding has just gone through a light workout in front of BBC Sport in Manchester. The altitude chamber in which he is training simulates 2,700m, and his chest rises and falls dramatically as the sweat drips to the floor.

Fielding's mind is now firmly on boxing. Just three years ago he struggled to focus on his sport while supporting his mum through cancer. She told him about her illness just days after his first career loss, to fellow Liverpudlian Callum Smith.

"I knew something had been building up but she said she didn't want to distract me," Fielding reflects.

"My grandfather had cancer at the same time. He'd be in bed asking how my mum was and telling me 'when you're a world champion I want a villa in Spain'."

Granddad passed away, but mum came through and she was sitting in the Baden-Arena in Offenburg, Germany, when her son won a version of the WBA world super-middleweight title in July. Well, not quite when he won.

"She likes being there in the atmosphere with everyone but when I fight she leaves the arena," says Fielding.

"To be back in the changing rooms with her, a world title, my three brothers and having fulfilled a childhood dream, it was a great moment for us. I was getting changed after it and she's putting my socks on, getting my clothes, doing what mums do."

Three months later, Fielding was in bed while his partner fed their newborn daughter Romi. His trainer Jamie Moore phoned him.
Fielding explains: "Jamie said 'Canelo wants to fight you', so I said 'what?'

"I asked what weight and when he said my weight - super-middleweight - I said 'sound, let's do it'.

"Then I'm thinking, how am I going to go to sleep now? So the next thing I'm in bed watching Canelo versus Gennady Golovkin on my phone."

In fact, Moore had been holding back on the news for a few days, having resolved not to tell his fighter until the deal was done.

Much of the boxing world was as shocked as Fielding, with Alvarez moving up a weight division fresh from signing a £278m five-year fight deal to make him boxing's highest-paid athlete.

Tweets that Fielding could not understand flooded in from Mexico, television channels suddenly wanted interviews by the bucket load and for the first time his next-door neighbour on the estate he had recently moved to began asking who he was.

A global media tour even saw him ring the bell to open the New York Stock Exchange for business, following in the footsteps of Nelson Mandela, Bill Gates and Mickey Mouse among others.

"I looked at the itinerary for the media week and the Wednesday said 'ring bell' and something else. I didn't have a clue what it was," admits Fielding.

"I walked into the Stock Exchange, I get a posh breakfast, there are pictures of me everywhere and I'm thinking 'oh my God'. My mates were texting saying 'I can't believe you did that, have you seen who has done that in the past?'

"Once the fight was announced, I knew what would come. Everyone now is on to me, talking about the fight, even some of the old women by my place. It will be the biggest win by any fighter in a long time."

Alvarez - one of seven brothers to fight professionally - is 1-20 with bookmakers. Should Fielding upset the two-weight world champion, the result would register in parts of the world a long way from Stockbridge Village - formerly known as Cantril Farm.

The area where Fielding played four football matches each weekend as a child sits in the borough of Knowsley, one of the most deprived areas in the UK according to government statistics released in 2015.

Fielding acknowledges it "wasn't the best of areas" but is proud of his childhood neighbourhood. 'Rocky from Stocky' has become something of a cult figure in Liverpool and when he moved to the outskirts of the city he became so waylaid by selfie requests from fans on simple trips to the supermarket that it took an age to buy a loaf of bread.

He says if he coached kids in the area now, the fighter he would tell them to watch is Alvarez, although true to his roots his own heroes were local.

Former British champion Tony Willis, and Peter Culshaw - a Commonwealth flyweight champion who won WBU and WBF world belts - inspired the young Fielding at Stockbridge Boxing Club, so much so he would miss morning school to watch them work out.

"When I'd be in the gym Peter was going to Tenerife to train so I was like wow, he's going abroad for a training camp," Fielding recalls.
"As the years went on I got in the ring with him for a move around and he caught me with a body shot. He boxed at eight stone, I was about 14 stone and I've never felt pain like it.

"I'd finish school on a Friday and go to watch fight shows in Liverpool, so I was around the changing rooms from a young age and thought 'I'd like this for me'. Then Peter won a world belt and brought it to my mum's house for me. I just thought 'I want this'."

Fielding took up boxing when his dad decided to get fit and visit the local boxing club. He enjoyed the buzz and has developed a knack for taking opportunities.

He entered a Prizefighter tournament at five days' notice in 2011 and won, while his last win saw him overcome the unbeaten German Tyron Zeuge at five weeks' notice to win the WBA 'regular' world super-middleweight title.

Alvarez still holds two world titles a weight division lower and represents a test unlike any the Briton has faced before.

But Fielding gives short shrift to those who write him off.

He says: "This is what I want to do in my life, I am putting everything into it, so how can people give me stick? I've had a few horrible messages on social media. How can you say that? I have been in this game since I was nine. I've had a lot of setbacks, ups and downs.

"People are saying I am selling my belt or I've lost before I fight. No, I am not selling anything - I accepted the fight before knowing the money.

"I also have my family, my boy and my newborn girl, so these things are for them, these are the reasons I miss the nursery runs, the weekend outings as a family, the night feeds.

"I turned professional with no promoter. My first fight was in a sport centre with 500 people. I got on the double-decker bus home with most of them. To now fight in Madison Square Garden as a world champion is unbelievable.

"I know how elite he is, I know how tough it will be, but beat him and I'm the next big thing in boxing."

A global platform awaits. The selfie requests would soar.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/boxing/46530439

[Master]

What’s it like to face Canelo? Past opponents talk about the experience



Rocky Fielding is facing a stern examination on Dec. 15, when he stands across the ring from Saul “Canelo” Alvarez and aims to do what only one man before him has managed, and that’s defeat the Mexican icon.

A wealth of talented operators including champions, prospects, undefeated stars, and sporting royalty, have attempted to combat Canelo’s size and accuracy, but with the exception of Floyd Mayweather Jr., and to a certain extent, Gennady Golovkin, they’ve all failed to out-fight the contemporary face of boxing.

One man who produced a spirited effort is Fielding’s former amateur club teammate, Liam Smith, who lost via a sickening stoppage in September 2016. Speaking to Sporting News the week before Alvarez’s rematch with Golovkin earlier this year, Smith had this to say:

“His variety is hard to live with. You have to be prepared for attacks from all angles because he throws every shot in the book and he throws them all with spite, too. His jab is good, his uppercut is good, he tries to make you miss and come back with counters. I know he had a lot of variety before I fought him because he was someone I had watched as a fan before it became a possibility he could become an opponent and it’s that variety that’s his biggest strength.”

With Alvarez emphatically taking Smith’s WBO belt at 154 pounds, another champion he managed to dethrone was New Mexico’s Austin Trout when he took his WBA super-lightweight title in 2013. Trout managed some success against Alvarez, but he lost on all three judges’ scorecards.

Speaking to Fighthype.com three years later, Trout was respectable about what he encountered in Canelo.

“He’s smart, he has good boxing savvy and he has explosive speed and power,” Trout said. “He makes his adjustments, but he’s a good fighter and I can’t take nothing from him. He’s exciting for the sport.”

With Alvarez now occupying the most coveted spots in boxing courtesy of his record breaking deal with streaming giant, DAZN, it’s increasingly difficult to cast thoughts back just a few years ago when he was an undercard attraction still fighting his way to the top of a brutal business.

As a supporting act to Floyd Mayweather’s tricky outing against Miguel Cotto, Alvarez dominated a faded Shane Mosley, once a pound-for-pound superstar himself, over 12 rounds. The native of Southern California would go on to enjoy numerous gym sessions with his conqueror and he has spoken candidly about Alvarez’s strengths.

“Canelo is really good,” Mosley told Fighthype earlier this year. “He’s got a good defense, he has got good movement. When he lost to Floyd, he was really young and even when he fought me he was only 20-years-old. He’s kind of like Fernando [Vargas] having these type of fights really early, but Floyd is not a puncher the way [Felix] Trinidad was, so he learned from that fight and he got better, which is good.”

Canelo’s only setback, which occurred in September 2015, came at the hands of Mayweather who was too experienced and skilled for the brief attacks that Alvarez launched towards him. The second fight of a monumental deal with Showtime, Canelo’s size and youth were seen as ideal attributes to trouble an aging Mayweather, but the Michigan born stylist, a great of the game, knew too much in every area to even be troubled by the man who would carry the sport once Floyd retired. With occasional talk of a rematch sometimes mentioned within the fight community, the rivalry is not dead yet, but Floyd has been both complimentary and insulting when discussing his past victim.

In the immediate aftermath of his fight with Alvarez, Mayweather took to the podium inside the MGM Grand and delivered a grand appraisal.

“First of all, I want to commend this young, strong champion,” said “Money” as he looked down to his left at a visibly distressed Alvarez, who had just endured the first defeat of his professional life. “He will carry the torch. Tonight, I want to say that experience played a major key. Canelo has everything that it takes to go on and be a legend in this sport, but tonight was just my night. Canelo is a thinker, I’m thinker, this was chess.”

Initial pleasantries would eventually turn to scorn, though, as Canelo became boxing’s biggest draw following the retirement of Mayweather. When the multi-weight champion returned to face UFC star, Connor McGregor, weeks before Alvarez shared the spotlight with Golovkin, mild digs were handed out by each camp as they both vied for those all important PPV numbers.

This past Oct. 18, out of nowhere, Mayweather went to his Instagram account to unleash a further attack on Alvarez with a “Throwback Thursday” hashtag underneath a photograph of Floyd landing a right uppercut on Canelo.

“It didn’t matter if Canelo ate his PED steak or not this night, this was by far the easiest night of my career,” Mayweather wrote. “Connor McQuiter was a way better fighter than Canelo’s cheating ass and I beat the brakes off him too. It takes me 36 mins or less to make $300 million plus. It literally takes me one night and one fight to make what you might make in five years and 11 fights. So really, who’s still winning? You do the math.”

With Floyd consistently showing fighters respect and disdain in equal measures ever since his glorious reign at super-featherweight, one must decide if his most recent outburst concerning Alvarez is his true opinion or his way of staying relevant in a sport that is trying to reinvent itself since he walked out the door last summer.

One fighter who has never been in the business of badmouthing his foes is Alfonso Gomez. Mexican like Canelo, Gomez took on his countryman in September 2011 on the same show where Mayweather knocked out a defenseless Victor Ortiz. Gomez performed admirably during the fight’s early going despite suffering a first-round flooring, but after receiving sustained punishment in the sixth session, the bout was called off, albeit slightly premature, by third man, Wayne Hedgpeth.

Gomez reflected on the fight when speaking to EsNewsReporting.com in 2012: “I would’ve adjusted some things that I was doing wrong as now I see that he was hunting me and waiting for an opportunity that did come. I was winning rounds and proving a point that maybe he wasn’t ready or that I’m not that bad, one or the other. I stepped into the ring and he wobbled me a bit and they stopped it. He hits pretty hard, decent fighter and he’s very good. It didn’t happen for me that night so I just got to keep moving forward.”

With professional opinions of Alavrez ranging from mediocre to excellent, depending what version of Mayweather to believe, the most damning assessment of the man aiming to become a three weight belt-holder on Saturday night comes from Kermit Cintron.

In 2011, the hardened Puerto Rican was extinguished in five rounds by Alvarez, but when speaking to Boxingscene in April this year, Cintron’s evaluation of the man who wiped out appeared slightly far-fetched.

“I honestly didn’t think too much of him when I fought him,” Cintron said. “He was a lot faster than I expected, but wasn’t as strong as people make him out to be. I rate Sergio Martinez over him skill-wise.”

The consensus from former foes of Canelo is that he is very much the world class fighter that has adorned high-class promotions for a number of years now. Fielding does not need to search far within the fight game to understand the man he’s facing at Madison Square Garden in just a few days, and once all has settled down in the showdown’s aftermath, the ambitious Englander will be another contributor to the varied war stories that star Alvarez.

https://uk.sports.yahoo.com/news/apo...150640466.html

[Alpha]

Any word on ticket sales? I doubt they will be that great.

[Master]

Any word on ticket sales? I doubt they will be that great.

Is it because it is in New York?