Anthony Crolla could be getting a shot at Vasiliy Lomachenko in the future, but first he will have to get by a fellow fighter also ranked in the top five of the WBA rankings.
It was announced by Matchroom Boxing that Crolla will face off against Indonesian fighter Daud Yordan as the top undercard fight for the November 10 card taking place at the Manchester Arena. The fight will be a final eliminator for the WBA lightweight title currently being held by Lomachenko.
Crolla, the No. 4 lightweight in the WBA rankings, has been itching to win back the lightweight title he lost to Jorge Linares. After a narrow unanimous decision loss to Linares in 2016, Crolla lost the rematch for the WBA title in 2017. Since then, Crolla has won his last two fights, defeating Ricky Burns and Edson Ramirez by unanimous decision.
Yordan has been fighting professionally since 2005 and sports a 38-3 record. Currently riding an eight-fight win streak, Yordan won the WBO Intercontinental lightweight title in his last fight back in April when he knocked out Pavel Malikov in the eighth round of their fight. Yordan sits in at No. 2 in the official WBA rankings.
Although the winner becomes the mandatory challenger to Lomachenko’s title, that fight wouldn’t take place until 2019 at the earliest. Lomachenko is planned to fight WBO champion Jose Pedraza in a unification fight on ESPN in December at Madison Square Garden though the fight has yet to be officially announced by Top Rank.
The Manchester Arena card will be headlined by Oleksandr Usyk’s first fight as the undisputed cruiserweight champion. He will defend his unified WBA, WBO, WBC, IBF and Ring Magazine cruiserweight titles against former cruiserweight champion Tony Bellew.
