Jack Catterall defends his WBA Intercontinental super lightweight belt against Jorge Linares on Saturday, October 21 at M&S Bank Arena in Liverpool, England. The pair squares off in the scheduled for 12 rounds bout live stream on DAZN. Ahead of the event, British former world title challenger and Venezuela’s three-division world champion took part in a virtual press conference.
Jack Catterall (27-1, 13 KOs) last fought in May in Manchester, where he scored a unanimous decision against Darragh Foley. Prior to that, the 30-year-old contender of Chorley, Lancashire challenged Josh Taylor for the undisputed title, but fell short dropping a split decision.
“First of all I’d like to thank Eddie, Robert and Linares for the opportunity,” said Jack Catterall. “I got the call quite some weeks ago now for this fight. I said to Sam straight away, ‘sign me up!’ I’m not in boxing to be fighting guys that want to come and roll over and build up a record. I want to test myself and see how good I can be in the sport of boxing. I’m excited.”
“I’ve seen Linares and his training videos – he seems very motivated and that excites me, it makes me go to the gym and work extra hard. Like Linares said, we want to make a beautiful fight. But not only that, I want to come away victorious. I think we all know Linares is a future Hall of Famer and I wouldn’t show the disrespect to any opponent by talking about any other fights right now.”
“I said to Sam and the team around me, we don’t talk about any fights – it’s 100% focus on Linares. We pay him that respect and we train hard to win that fight on October 21st. I think that’s why the fight is exciting – Linares has been over to our turf, my turf, and always picked up the victories. I’m next up now to defend our turf and pick up the win.”
Jorge Linares (47-8, 29 KOs) is looking to get back to winning ways. Barinas, Venezuela’s 37-year-old was in action last November when he suffered the defeat by unanimous decision against Zhora Hamazaryan. “El Nino” previously fought in the UK, scoring a pair of wins by UD against Anthony Crolla in Manchester and the 10th-round TKO against Kevin Mitchell in Greenwich.
‘I feel like I’m a World Champion right now’
“I feel happy,” said Jorge Linares, who over the course of his career held WBC lightweight and featherweight titles, as well as the WBA super featherweight belt. “I’m trying to take care of myself. All of the time, inside the gym and outside of the gym. I try to have a very comfortable life.”
“I was in Japan for 20 years. The life in Japan is totally different to life in the United States and also Latin America, that’s why I look like this.”
“Thank you to you Eddie, thank you to Jack and to Sam and Roberto Diaz again for this amazing opportunity to come back to the UK because you know my story there. I had amazing fighters there three times. This is an amazing dream for me. I always wanted to go back to the UK to make another amazing fight with the best 135lbs or 140lbs fighter. The best option was Jack Catterall.
“The motivation that I have right now is the same it was seven or eight years ago. This is the moment. This is the most important fight. I want to make an amazing show for the people to enjoy, and to enjoy myself. We’re going to make a beautiful fight. This is the most difficult fight of my life. I need to win this fight. I feel like I’m a World Champion right now. I need to come to the UK to defend all my belts. This is the responsibility that I have right now, the pressure that I have right now.”
“This time is different because I come from a loss. After this fight something big is coming for me. That’s why it’s very important for me to win this fight.”
In Australia, Catterall vs Linares airs live on Sunday, October 22.
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