LONDON • Gennady Golovkin has dismissed the idea that American Floyd Mayweather Jr's comeback against Conor McGregor will overshadow his Sept 16 boxing clash with Saul "Canelo" Alvarez.
The World Boxing Council, International Boxing Federation, and World Boxing Association middleweight champion defends his world title belts at the T-Mobile Arena three weeks after Mayweather faces Conor McGregor at the same Las Vegas venue.
Mayweather, 40, will not have fought for nearly two years by the time he faces 28-year-old Irishman McGregor, a mixed martial arts fighter, on Aug 26.
But McGregor, a two-weight Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC) champion, has never fought as a professional boxer and faces the sport's best practitioner for decades.
Golovkin (37-0, 33 KOs) insists his fight with Alvarez (49-1-1, 34 KOs) is bigger and more significant than Mayweather vs McGregor, which he sees as a "circus show".
"This (Mayweather-McGregor) is not for fighters, but business," the 35-year-old told reporters at a press conference in London Monday.
"I think people understand what is a true fight, a boxing fight, like mine with Canelo or a big show, maybe sometimes for people a funny show, like a circus show.
"Everybody knows - Conor is not a boxer."
Regardless of some dismissing it as a mismatch, Mayweather-McGregor is expected to do record business for a boxing fight and may eclipse Golovkin-Alvarez in revenue and television viewers.
But Golovkin-Alvarez is a fight for the ages, one of the most eagerly awaited boxing match-ups in recent memory. It pits two crowd-pleasing icons against each other to decide the world's best middleweight boxer.
Golovkin, a knockout machine from Kazakhstan but now based in California, has made 18 consecutive world middleweight title defences, but was taken to points for the first time since 2008 by American Daniel Jacobs in March.
Alvarez also has an impressive record that has seen him win world titles in two weight divisions with one blemish - a majority points loss decision to Mayweather in 2013.
"I have to be careful with everything when facing him because he's good all around," said the 26-year-old, who cruised to a wide points win over compatriot Julio Cesar Chavez Jr in May.
"There's a lot of probability there will be knockout, as we can both punch."
AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE
