Billy Joe Saunders suffered yet another injury that will delay his upcoming WBO middleweight title defense.
Saunders, who was scheduled to defend his title against Martin Murray on June 23 in London, suffered an unspecified injury that will postpone the bout. The fight was going to headline a boxing card at the O2 Arena in London planned to be streamed in the United States on ESPN+.
Both Saunders and promoter Frank Warren made the announcement on Twitter, which you can see below.
The fight was originally supposed to happen on April 14, but Saunders suffered a hand injury which initially postponed the fight. In a video posted on his Instagram account, Murray expressed his frustrations at having to wait for his middleweight world title shot and frustrations of Saunders potentially chasing a fight against Canelo Alvarez and Gennady Golovkin.
"He's sh*t out again. The first time, it was his hand. Now it's his hamstring. We know that's trying to make a big money fight with Golovkin or Canelo and I'm too risky to fight. He just don't want to fight me, but there's nothing I can do. This is the second time I've took myself away from my family, got my body in this condition, ready to fight, and I get told last minute it's canceled," Murray said.
Saunders, who won the WBO title from Andy Lee in 2015, but has only defended the title three times. His last defense took place last December when he handily beat former world champion David Lemieux on HBO.
Murray has challenged for a world title four times, but sports an 0-3-1 record in those fights. Murray has fought for the WBO and WBA super middleweight, WBC and WBA middleweight titles in the past, facing the likes of George Groves, Sergio Martinez, Felix Sturm, Arthur Abraham and Golovkin. Murray has since then won his last three fights.
