IBF, IBO, and WBA middleweight champion Gennady Golovkin has yet to confirm his next opponent early next year, but the undefeated Kazakh is already in line to fight some of the best fighters in a stacked middleweight division.

George Gigney of Boxing News Online listed down potential fillers for Golovkin before “GGG” faces Saul “Canelo” Alvarez for the WBC middleweight belt, which is expected to happen in September 2016. Among the list of fighters that Gigney wrote down, WBO Billy Joe Saunders seems to be the ideal opponent Golovkin should face prior to Alvarez.

“Saunders claimed the WBO title when he outpointed Ireland’s Andy Lee at the weekend, meaning if Golovkin were to fight and beat Saunders, his clash with Canelo would be for all the middleweight marbles,” Gigney wrote. “A slick southpaw with decent power, Billy Joe would be a tough night for any middleweight,” he added.

Saunders joined boxing rising stars in the middleweight class after outpointing Andy Lee on Saturday, Dec. 19, at the Manchester Arena in United Kingdom. After the win, the British middleweight is primed for a big fight with the likes of Golovkin, Miguel Cotto and Daniel Jacobs.

However, Saunders has stated that he is not ready to face Golovkin yet and would only be willing to go against the Kazakh knockout artist if there is £4 million (over $AU8 million) on the table. According to Scott Gilfoid of Boxing News 24, with Saunders possibly dodging Golovkin, the latter has missed out on the chance to snatch the WBO title as part of the Kazakh’s goal to unify all middleweight belts.

“This is so, so sad that Saunders doesn’t want to do the right thing and face Golovkin in a unification fight,” Gilfoid noted. “It would have been a great fight for the sport to elevate it to the highest levels so that we could have eliminated one of the paper champions and given the fans a chance to get a unified title holder.”

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