Turki Alalshikh steps back from potential Canelo-Crawford fight

By: Sean Crose

“Just wrapped up an important meeting now with my team,” Saudi boxing guru Turki Alalshikh posted on social media Tuesday, “planning for the upcoming fights that we will make for 2024-2025.” Alalshikh then went on to discuss the hoped for (in some quarters) potential fight between Canelo Alvarez and Terence Crawford. “I decided to disregard the Canelo fight,” Alalshikh said, “as I don’t want it anymore.” Although he didn’t outright say why, Canelo is rumored to have demanded an outrageous sum of money. Also, Crawford is significantly smaller than super middleweight Canelo – which might make for a one sided affair.

Yet Alalshikh still has his mind on big events. “I will be focusing for the US market with bigger fights,” he stated, “especially for the legend Crawford. Additionally, I will support making fights for Boots, Haney, Shakur, Ortiz, Anderson, Benavidez, Zepeda and more, regarding Tim Tszyu, there’s something unclear with the communications from his team with our team, so I believe I will reconsider his situation.”

And that’s not all. “I am focusing on Riyadh Season card,” Alalshikh adds, “wembley [sic] edition 21st of September (AJ vs. Dubois) and depending on the results and the results of Riyadh Season’s opening card (Bivol vs. Beterbiev) on the 12th of October, I will build the card for the rematch of Fury vs. Usyk on the 21st of December and another big card on the first quarter of 2025. Stay tuned.”

As for Canelo, he’s got a September 14th bout ahead of him against Edgar Berlanga. Although Berlanga isn’t seen as a top opponent for Canelo, there’s no denying that the red haired star is at the point in his career where he can face pretty much anyone he wants. Unfortunately, the same can’t be said for Crawford, who has only had one blockbuster fight (late summer’s utter destruction of Spence) to his name.

Now that he’s backed by none other than Alalshikh, however, Crawford might well find himself in more lucrative and even high profile bouts. For, if anything can be said about Alalshikh it’s that he can make notable fights happen. He is, in short, a good friend to have in the contemporary boxing scene. Canelo might disagree, but Alakshikh has already lined up a considerable number of major fights, and will no doubt line up more in the near future.

At least for the moment, however, Canelo-Crawford won’t be seen on his agenda.