Turkish welterweight star Selcuk Aydin got really upset when he read speculations about Andre Berto’s next possible opponents without his name even mentioned.
“How can Berto and his promoter even talk to and about guys like Ortiz when they know exactly that they have to fight me first?”, asks Aydin who is currently in his hometown Trabzon (Turkey) where he already started training for his world title fight. “This is very disrespectful and really pisses me off.. They know exactly that I am the mandatory challenger. I stepped aside once and allowed them an easy win over a stiff. Now they want to take the easy way out again by just discussing possible fights and completely ignoring me. I don’t understand this kind of behaviour.”
Selcuk Aydin has been waiting for his title shot for one and a half years now and has earned his right to fight for the title the hard way. He won two elimination bouts against Said Ouali (April 2009) and Jackson Bonsu (July 2009) and beat “Jo-Jo” Dan Ion in a very close and exciting fight for the vacant WBC silver championship in June 2010 to secure his mandatory status.
Originally WBC welterwelight titlist Andre Berto was due to fight Aydin in November last year. Aydin and his co-promoters ARENA Sports-Promotion and Don King allowed the champ and his promoter Lou DiBella to voluntarily fight Freddy Hernandez in an intermediate bout. Still all parties agreed that the mandatory defense would be next without any other fights in between.
“If Berto still wants to duck me after almost two years he should just relinquish the title”, states Aydin. “When I read about these plans of fighting some other guys I have lost all respect for him. He is not a real champion. He doesn’t fulfil his obligations. He should stop wearing the belt that I should have stripped from him a long time ago. I wonder how he can even look into the mirror.”
The WBC has ordered a purse bid for the mandatory championship fight between Aydin and Berto to take place on Friday, January 28th 2010 in Mexico if the parties cannot reach an agreement until that date.