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Pacquiao will fight this December By Eddie Alinea PhilBoxing.com Sun, 09 Sep 2012  MANILA (PNA) -- The fight on December 8 is on! Eight-division world champion Manny Pacquiao made this vow in a statement to close friend Wakee Salud when the two met last Thursday. ?Tuloy and laban. Yun ang siniguro niya sa akin (The fight will push through as scheduled. That?s what he assured me),? Salud told this writer in a long distance telephone interview yesterday from Cebu City where he is based. Salud failed to disclose though who the dethroned World Boxing Organization welterweight champion will face on that date except to say that some ?problems? have to be ?threshed out? before Manny finally decides who he will fight next.? As in the past week, the choice from whom Pacquiao will select is between undefeated American Timothy Bradley, whom he beat black and blue last June 9 but for the two judges who scored in favor of the challenger, and Mexican legend Juan Manuel Marquez, who he defeated twice ? a split verdict in the second meeting and majority decisions in the third of their trilogy. ?My reading is he has already decided as to who he will meet next, but he?s just waiting for the resolution of these problems before announcing his decision,? Salud hinted. ?In the next few days, we will definitely know it.? ?Manny just would like to ask boxing fans? forgiveness for making them wait this long. The fight has been moved, anyway to December 8 (from November 10) and there?s no reason to hurry things up,? he said. The same to you his friends in media kung hindi niya nasasagot ang tawag o text nyo. Konting pasensya lang.? Another hint that the decision is coming soon is the announcement made by Top Rank?s Bob Arum, Pacquiao?s promoter, last Thursday that the introductory press conference to promote the fight has been scheduled September 18 in Los Angeles. ?Manny is being mature in his decision,? Arum told the Los Angeles Times the other day. ?He?s taking his time, really thinking about it. Before (he decides) at the spur of the moment. Now he is considering all of it.? ?I would?ve said were going this way last night and another way this morning,? Arum said. It?s between those two.? Arum echoed Salud?s statement on December 8 schedule despite apprehensions by some in the business community that the Filipino ring icon might skip fighting this year and concentrate on a 2013 mega-fight with undefeated welterweight Floyd Mayweather Jr. Miguel Cotto, whom Pacquiao knocked out in 12 rounds in 2009, was originally part of a three-fighter equation but was ruled out when the Puerto Rican opted to battle instead WBA junior middleweight champ Austin Trout on December 1 at the Madison Square Garen in New York. Arum looks leaning toward a Pacquiao-Marquez IV on the strength of the Latino pay-per-view audience, which resulted in a 1.25 million buys in a stark contrast to the disappointing 850,000 buys generated by the June Pacquiao-Bradley showdown. ?Marquez is the more lucrative fight, and the more difficult fight,? Arum said aa quoted by the L. A. Times, which could be the main reason in Pacquiao?s making his final decision. Salud agreed, in an interview last week, also by the Journal, he said a Marquez victory in his fourth fight against the Filipino might jeopardize the meeting with Mayweather, definitely the fight the entire boxing world has been eagerly awaiting that could break all the existing records at the box office and ppv. Bradley?s demand for a guaranteed $10-million purse could be another hindrance in the decision for a rematch. Click here to view a list of other articles written by Eddie Alinea.  |
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