Saúl “Canelo” Álvarez varnished his reputation as the world’s greatest boxer by becoming the first undisputed super-middleweight champion in Las Vegas. It took patience and perfectly timed belligerence to knock out Caleb Plant in the 11th round at the MGM Grand Garden Arena, but there was a sense of inevitability by the end.
Plant, 29, leaves with the first blot on his record but his reputation intact. The man from Nashville did all he could and frustrated Álvarez early on with his jab and speed, but the Mexican’s thudding body shots took their toll before a left hook and right uppercut floored his opponent in the penultimate round. Plant, fuelled by an emotional backstory in which he lost his daughter in 2015 and his mother in a police shooting in 2019, rose again but was stripped of both senses and defence. He was ripe for Álvarez’s clinical finishing. One more charge, one more flurry and one more right hand was enough. The fight was over; the legend still has some way to go.
So Plant’s IBF belt was added to Álvarez’s WBC, WBA and WBO versions to complete the set. “It keeps me happy and very motivated to be one of the six [four-belt] undisputed champions of the world,” Álvarez said. It may be time to move back to light-heavyweight where he was last seen beating Sergey Kovalev to claim the WBO title in 2019, but he was right to savour this achievement.
Four-belt champions do not come along often and the only other men to have claimed that tag are Oleksandr Usyk, Bernard Hopkins, Jermain Taylor, Terence Crawford and Josh Taylor. Álvarez is a four-weight champion and his success recalls Sid Waddell’s old line about the darts champion Eric Bristow. “When Alexander of Macedonia was 33, he cried salt tears because there were no more worlds to conquer — Bristow’s only 27.” Álvarez is 31 and will have to get creative to find a true test.
Watching Álvarez afterwards, it would have been hard to guess that he had been in a world-title fight but for the garish leather jacket with its champion motif. Unmarked and unemotional, as well as undisputed, he paid tribute to Plant and his own trainer, Eddy Reynoso, and then said: “We are always looking for the best fights and defending the title is always important, but we have to enjoy the moment because this is really meaningful.”
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He said he would sit down with Reynoso and his team in January to decide where next, but would probably fight in May. “I have nothing in particular in mind right now but I love challenges. I am ready for any challenge. I love boxing as much as I did 16 years ago. I never lost that discipline and passion.”
We are witnessing a sporting great in his prime. Plant fought well, with some suggesting he was ahead going into the 11th but he was down on all three judges’ cards. Plant threw more punches but Álvarez landed 117 to 101. Significantly, he landed 102 power punches to Plant’s 59 and 53 body shots to Plant’s 13. As ever, the power told and, for all his efforts, Plant did not have enough of it.
Nevertheless, his movement was a conundrum that Álvarez did not completely solve for the majority of the fight. At times Álvarez was made to look rugged, missing more often than normal, and Plant’s fast hands showed his class.
He edged a couple of the early rounds as Álvarez took his time but at the end of the fifth, when he had cause to be satisfied with his start, Plant might have looked across the canvas to see his opponent standing throughout the break. The message was clear: if he was frustrated, he was also untroubled.
“Eddy calmed me down when I got to the corner and I was getting a little anxious,” Álvarez said. “I admit I was a little frustrated especially in the first five rounds, but the second part of the fight was exactly as we had envisioned it.”
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It has taken Álvarez less than a year to unify the division with wins over Callum Smith, Billy Joe Saunders and now Plant. Add in February’s humbling of Avni Yildirim and he has had four fights in 11 months, a work ethic for which boxing should be thankful. His Mexican fanbase made it a Las Vegas love-in at the MGM and if it went a few rounds more than he had predicted, none of them cared.
After the bad blood of the build-up, including punches and family insults at September’s press conference, there was mutual respect at the end. “He wanted to keep fighting and continue but there is no shame,” Álvarez said. “He told me what he said about my mother he didn’t mean and he was truly sorry about that. I told him it was OK, it’s water under the bridge. I said I hope someday he has a great family as well. I only wish the best for him.”
