Canelo Alvarez gets his 2023 underway this Saturday night when he returns to Mexico for the first time in over a decade to face the challenge of John Ryder. You know with Canelo and how serious he is about competition, he’ll be desperate to get back in the ring with Dmitry Bivol, but first he must cope with Ryder because the man from Islington will give it everything.
It’s hard to know where Canelo’s mind is right now because it wasn’t long ago that his incredible achievements had him looking at a potential move to cruiserweight and even heavyweight. The Bivol loss will have been a huge eye-opener for the brilliant Mexican, but I can’t be sure that Ryder even featured in his plans 12 months ago. John deserves a lot of credit for that.
The defeat to Bivol last May is something that Canelo won’t take lightly. I mentioned earlier about his grand plans to go through even more weight divisions, but he won’t want to leave that fight as unfinished business. Canelo is a very proud competitor and he’ll want revenge over Bivol, but he can only get closer to do that by getting past Ryder.
John is a fighter who I've known for a very long time, and I like him, and his team, a lot. He’s cut no corners in boxing and although he may not be widely known in America and Mexico, he definitely deserves this moment. He gave Callum Smith a great fight, beat Danny Jacobs, and managed to get past Zach Parker when he was a big underdog. He’s done it the proper way.
Throughout his career, John has had some really hard setbacks, but he’s always dusted himself down, got back in the gym, and came back for more every single time. I admire that a lot in a fighter and I’m delighted he’s got this big opportunity, but he’s going to find out very quick just how elite a fighter Canelo is.
To give John any chance in this fight then he’s going to have to give the performance of his career and even that might not be enough. Could Canelo have an off night or even look past John? Maybe, but I just think he’s too professional and he’ll give John the utmost respect and treat this fight as a serious threat.
John needs to do what he done against Smith and that’s try and get on the inside and get in Canelo’s face and just make it a hard fight. Canelo, in my opinion, is the best counter puncher in the sport and I think he’ll just be too good for Ryder in too many areas. John can emerge from the fight with a lot of credit, but it’ll be Canelo who gets his hand raised after an entertaining 12 round fight.