• Light-heavyweight

Cleverly keen on Maccarinelli match-up

Nathan Cleverly meets Tommy Karpency on Saturday © Getty Images

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WBO light-heavyweight champion Nathan Cleverly is refusing to rule out the prospect of an all-Welsh showdown with Enzo Maccarinelli later this year.

Maccarinelli competed at light-heavyweight last November - a first-round stoppage over Gyorgy Marosi - having suffered a punishing loss in a European cruiserweight title battle against Alexander Frenkel just over a year before.

And the former WBO cruiserweight king, who has had first-hand experience of being in the ring with Cleverly, could find himself back at world-title level in a matter of months.

"If he does stay at light-heavy, builds his name back up and gets himself back into contention for my title I'm sure it would be a big fight for Wales," Cleverly, who defends against Tommy Karpency on Saturday, told boxingscene.com.

"Obviously we did a lot of sparring when we were both at Enzo Calzaghe's but I was a 19-year-old middleweight and he was a big powerful cruiserweight. Even then, ability wise, I always felt I was a level above him."

Cleverly is still hunting the biggest names in the division, however - and is keen on the idea of meeting Jean Pascal, who has a loss to Carl Froch on his record. "Pascal is a fight that definitely interests me," he said.

"I think our styles would really blend well. He's a big name and a huge draw in his home country. I'd be prepared to go to Canada, if needed. He's big, strong, powerful, pumped up, explosive but I'd back my speed and stamina to wear him down over the 12 rounds."

However, his first priority is getting his hands on another of the belts at light-heavyweight. "If I could choose [my next fight], I'd go with unification against either [WBA king] Shumenov or [IBF boss] Cloud," he said. "Both would be progressive moves towards getting to the very top guys in the division, [Bernard] Hopkins and [Chad] Dawson."

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