Raymond Muratalla says he is going to do a unification fight against WBO lightweight champion Keyshawn Davis after picking up the 135-pound IBF belt.
#4 Muratalla (22-0, 17 food) is fighting on #2 Zaur Abdullaev (20-1, 12 food) for the IBF TUSenty lightweight title on May 10 at the Pechanga Arena in San Diego, California. The event will be shown Live on ESPN and ESPN+, start at 22:00 Et/19:00 pm pt.
The winner of the Muratalla-Abdullaev fight will either be upgraded to the full IBF lightweight champion status, or they will fight for the belt against current champion Vasily Lomachenko.
Loma has been out of action due to a back injury since the conquest of the vacant IBF title on May 12 last year against George Kambosos Jr. Lomachenko until October 8 to defend his IBF title against the Muratalla winner against Abdullaev fight.
Keyshawn next?
Muratalla is expected to defeat Abdullaev to put himself in a position to be upgraded to the IBF lightweight champion or fighting Lomachenko. If he gets his hands on the IBF title, he’s going to be on the top ranking to fight the unification with WBO champion Keyshawn Davis. They promote both fighters. So it must be an easy struggle to make.
“The one who makes the most sense is Keyshawn (Davis). He’s with the top rankings, and I’m with the highest rank. I think it will be the one that is likely to happen,” said Raymond Muratalla, a light welter weight. Sean Zittel about a fight he wants for a world title.
Keyshawn would make sense if he and the top rank were prepared to put him into a risky opponent for a change. All you have to do is look at the kind of opponents he has fought since he became pro in 2021 to know that he is going the manufactured route to artificial stars. This is when a fighter is connected to tomato cans to set a record to turn it into a PPV-Pseudo star. Keyshawn is not going to break some of that carefully guided path to fight and lose Muratalla.
“I think it’s the one that is likely to happen because he’s with the top rankings. Gervonta and Shakur, they have already had plans. I think it’s the one that makes the most sense, and it’s the one that is most likely to happen, ‘says Muratalla.
Muratalla is very unlikely to have a chance to fight Keyshawn for his WBO lightweight title because he is carefully connected by the top rank. He has not yet fought anyone who had a remote chance to hit him. The guys who could give Keyshawn problems, Andy Cruz, Muratalla and Abdullah Mason, he showed no interest in fighting. He is quickly outgrowing the 135 pound division, and he can go up to 140 by next year.
Davis holds out the hope that he can stay with lightweight long enough to get a big mega match against Gervonta Davis, but that won’t happen without Turki Alalshikh interested in financeing it. In a positive sign, Turki made Keyshawn one of his brand ambassadors for his ring Magazine this week. If he wants to see how Keyshawn fights against a lively body like Andy Cruz or Muratalla before moving to light welterweight, he can do it. Without him, Keyshawn will not volunteer against Muratalla or Cruz because of the high probability of being exposed.
Farmer fight
“I think I should have gone in there and bullied him,” Muratalla said, regretting that he no longer fought aggressively in his fight against Tevin Farmer last year on July 13. “I think I thought too much. That was all it was. I could have done a lot more. ‘
Muratalla focuses on throwing single shots and believing that he can knock out the farmer with the help of the approach. It was the wrong style to use against the former IBF Super Featherweight Champion for having a good chin, and he missed him.
“They told me in my corner just to let my hands go, and that’s all I had to do. You saw in the final round what happened when I let my hands go (Muratalla hurt a farmer). I tried to find a big shot to hurt him, and it was probably a mistake I made, just to look for a big shot, ‘says Muratalla.
In Raymond’s fight against Farmer, he did not chase himself to the tenth round with uninterrupted combinations, and he came close to striking him. However, if Muratalla was to fight against Farmer again, there is no guarantee that he would have success by using a high-output style because he comes from back-to-back fighting against William Zepeda. Tevin found out how to neutralize the output by holding and moving a lot.
“There are many skills I haven’t shown yet,” Muratalla said of his upcoming fight against Zaur Abdullaev on May 10 in San Diego, California. “I can’t wait to show the world the kind of skills I really have. I think he’s going to fight, and I’ll be 100% ready for it. He is not just there.
‘100%. I think a belt records my name with theirs, “Muratalla said when asked if a world title would be his bargaining” chip “to get the bigger battles he wanted. They can no longer avoid it. So, I’m definitely going to be a call for the shots if all goes well. ‘
Last updated on 04/17/2025
