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World Boxing Council President Mauricio Sulaiman was very impressed with Saturday’s big win by Teofimo Lopez.
Lopez unified the WBC Franchise, WBA, WBO, IBF lightweight titles with a twelve round unanimous decision over heavily favored Vasiliy Lomachenko at the MGM Grand’s Conference Center in Las Vegas.
According to Sulaiman, Lopez will attend a planned ceremony in Mexico City to officially receive the emblematic green and gold WBC belt from the sanctioning body.
He felt Lopez’s used the right tactics in the fight and Lomachenko was unable to make adjustments.
“Teofimo will come to Mexico City soon. We will have a face to face event to enjoy his visit with corresponding care [against COVID-19]. He’s living in a special moment in his life,” said Sulaimán, who highlighted López’s work.
“Lopez is the Unified and undisputed champion. He managed to dominate when it came to tactics. My opinion is that Lomachenko expected a ‘hurricane’ to come, forcing him to make his strategy based on counterattacks, but Teofimo had different game plan and Lomachenko did not know how to adjust. It was very clear in the first half of the fight that he was not there.”
Sulaimán believes the contest should certainly receive consideration for ‘Fight of the Year’ based on the quality of the boxers and level of skill as the bout played out.
“The styles did not clash and it didn’t have the emotion that one expected [because of no crowd], but I liked it a lot, because it’s not just about throwing punches. There is a very important future in the lightweight division, because right now it has become the richest in talent and with the combination [of matches] that can be made,” Sulaiman said.
The WBC Prez would like to see Lopez fight the likes of WBC “regular” champion Devin Haney and the winner of the WBC interim-title fight between Ryan Garcia and Luke Campbell.