Former WBC super-bantamweight champion Oscar Larios has been confirmed as the next man to step into the ring with the fearsome ruler of the featherweight divisions, Manny Pacquiao.
Mexican Larios, 56-4-1 (36), has the unenviable assignment of travelling to the Pac-Man’s home of Manila, in the Philippines, on May 20 to take on the man who has knocked out the two best Mexican fighters of the current generation, Marco Antonio Barrera and Erik Morales.
Pacquiao is hero-worshipped on a scale almost unheard of in his native land. A one-man industry, he not only brings the country to a standstill when he boxes but also sells out movie houses with his action flicks, shifts half a million copies of his singing CDs and pretty much any other endorsement you care to mention.
But boxing is what he does best and Pacquiao will face Morales in a rubber match in Las Vegas in September but Larios is most certainly not a ‘warm-up’ opponent for ‘El Terrible’.
Larios, 29, is coming off a shock third round loss to former victim Israel Vazquez but he has also beaten the likes of Wayne McCullough (twice), Nedal Hussein and Willie Jorrin.
Pac-Man’s promoter Gary Shaw told SecondsOut: “Larios is a good fighter, a world champion, but Manny is in the form of his life.”
