He makes his debut under the Matchroom promotional banner tomorrow night in Liverpool, fighting up at 168 lb for the very first time against Georgia’s George Beroshvili in what is something of an “easing into the division” fight – yet Martin Murray has his sights on the division’s big-guns – and is hopefully looking towards big money-fights with new IBF champion James DeGale and WBC mandatory George Groves in the none too distant future.
Murray, who extended Gennady Golovkin further than any man previously when he took him 11 rounds in Monaco back in February, spoke to iFLtv about his fight tomorrow night – and just what lies in store beyond that.
He said;
“This is gonna be a really hard fight for me. He’s gonna come and have a go, like – and from what I’ve seen of him, he does – but the bigger picture is obviously the bigger fights. This fight’s just about me establishing myself as a super middleweight and building from there.”
We are evidently going to be seeing Murray fight less than stellar opposition on the regular Matchroom cards for a fight or two after this, ostensibly for the benefit of the ‘casual fan’ – yet Eddie Hearn will not want to keep Murray away from the likes of DeGale – another Matchroom fighter – for too long. There are some big money fights to be made.
Murray, agrees with that assertion;
“Definitely. I’ve always wanted the big domestic fights at middleweight. They never happened. Stepping up to super now, the talent we’ve got domestically is unbelievable, you know? Also I think me moving up, these are the type of fights that can happen.”
“Everybody’s wanting the big domestic fights, you know for the world titles. Hopefully George Groves is gonna pull through – he’s fighting August I believe – obviously James DeGale’s got his (IBF) – and those are the big fights that I’m working towards. Now I’ve moved up, I’m sure they can happen.”
With Murray making this move to 168 lb the potential for some really big domestic world title fights exists, especially if George Groves does take Badou Jack’s WBC title in August as many expect him to.
With Liverpool’s unbeaten super-middleweights Callum Smith and Rocky Fielding in the mix – and Frank Buglioni an outside chance to capture a world title against Fedor Chudinov next month, it really is exciting times for the super middleweight division in the UK.
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