As expected, the WBA has ordered secondary super featherweight titleholder Andrew Cancio to face mandatory challenger Rene Alvarado.
The organization announced that Cancio must defend his title against Alvarado and has enforced the order as Cancio was originally supposed to face Alvarado next when he won the belt back in February. Cancio won the belt with a win over Alberto Machado, but instead of facing Alvarado, Cancio went ahead with an immediate rematch against Machado. Cancio would go on to win the rematch on June 21. The WBA said both parties have until July 28 to negotiate a deal or else a purse bid will be ordered.
The World Boxing Association (WBA) Championships Committee has ordered the fight between regular champion of the super featherweight class American Andrew Cancio and the mandatory challenger from Nicaragua, Rene Alvarado.
The communication was sent to the team of the champion, as supported by rule 11 of Championships states that the champion must defend his title in the span of 120 days since he won it.
In the case of Cancio, he won his crown on February 9th, meaning he had to face Alvarado before June 9th, a time that has already expired.
Rule C.13 details that a champion cannot defend against a boxer who is not the mandatory challenger within 60 days after the expiration of the period for his mandatory defense.
Based on the above, the WBA Championships Committee has given 30 days, from this day of June 28th to carry out the negotiations and this period will expire on July 28th.
If an agreement is not reached in that time or one of the parties refuses to sign a contract, the Committee will have the right to call the fight to auction.
The news of Cancio facing Alvarado was expected given that not only was Alvarado the mandatory challenger, but also Cancio himself has said he was interested in facing him next. Before the rematch against Machado, the WBA champion said he wanted to give Alvarado a chance to fight for the title after facing Machado one more time. Cancio told Fightful he would set his sights on facing WBA "Super" champion Gervonta Davis and the other champions at 130 pounds after fighting Cancio.
“I would like to, but I know Rene Alvarado is the No. 1 mandatory and I know he’s patiently waiting for me and Machado to end this fight right here. If I were to come out on top, I would like to give him the opportunity to fight for the world title. [Rene] and I had a very great first fight when we fought years back. He’s been on a winning streak ever since and I feel like it would be appropriate to give him the opportunity to fight and try to win the world title against me. Then hopefully after that, if I come out victorious, then definitely I will go after the other titleholders,” Cancio said.
The two fighters fought all the way back in 2015 with Cancio stopping Alvarado late in the eighth round. Since that loss to Cancio, the 30-year-old Alvarado would go on to win eight of his next 10 fights.
