French warrior Christian Mbilli made quite the impressive statement last night in taking out the tough, only once before stopped Maciej Sulecki, in a single round to take the WBC interim strap at 168 pounds.
The all-action Mbilli was thought to have been headed for a testing fight with the Polish contender, yet he instead scored the early win in Quebec City, Canada.
Now 29-0(24) and absolutely deserving of a shot at the full WBC title, 30-year-old Mbilli has fast become plenty of people’s favourite fighter, or at least one of them. Sulecki stopped only by Diego Pachecho before last night. This was from body shots mid-way through their August fight from last year. He didn’t have any time to get into the fight, and he is now 33-4(13).
Christian Mbilli: Threat to Canelo’s Reign
For Mbilli, it’s onwards and upwards, and he will possibly land a slot on the Canelo-Terence Crawford card in September. But of course, the fight Mbilli really craves is one with the Mexican superstar himself. Bob Arum, though, has already said he strongly feels there is no way Canelo will fight Mbilli, that he will instead “look for relatively easy fights if he gets by Crawford.”
But Mbilli, with his fanbase growing and growing, and with his performances getting better and better, may soon have fans demanding that Canelo does the right thing and agrees to face him. David Benavidez aside, Mbilli is arguably the biggest threat to Canelo right now, unless you buy into the idea that Crawford will actually pull off this historic win in Las Vegas and that he will upset Canelo.
If he does beat Crawford and then sticks around and doesn’t retire, will Canelo prove critics like Arum wrong and defend against Mbilli, or might he opt to vacate the WBC belt and swerve the relentless slugger who also seems to have a granite chin?