OLEKSANDR Gvozdyk has heaped praise on Dmitry Bivol for taking his career to a new level.
The 32-year-old created one of the biggest boxing stories of 2022 when he defeated Canelo Alvarez on points. Bivol went on to comfortably beat Gilberto Ramirez in November rounding off a memorable year for the Russian.
Gvozdyk 18-1 (14) sparred Canelo for his second career outing at light-heavyweight and like many predicted the world super-middleweight champion would win against Bivol. The Ukrainian told Boxing News he was impressed by the winner.
“In the (Canelo) fight Bivol looked way more impressive.
“Canelo was his big thing to prove to himself that he really belongs to [the] elite, to pound for pound fighters. He handled [it] very good. Now you can see very big improvements in him. It goes from your mental state so now he believes in himself. You can feel it by the way he’s talking, by the way he’s fighting, by the way he’s looking. He’s a different fighter, he’s even more dangerous, way stronger.”
Bivol and Canelo are rumoured to be fighting each other once again this September in a rematch at 175lbs but the Mexican has to first defeat John Ryder this Saturday in Guadalajara.
“I think it’s a 50-50 fight. Very interesting. Bivol is very good right now,” said Gvozdyk.
Gvozdyk returns to the ring on Saturday against former Joshua Buatsi opponent Ricards Bolotniks. The light-heavyweight contest takes place on the Canelo-Ryder undercard in Mexico. It will be the former champion’s second fight in three and a half years after walking away from the sport following his defeat to Artur Beterbiev.