Mexican boxing superstar and undisputed super middleweight (168 pounds) champion, Canelo Alvarez, who has also held a light heavyweight title, did not want to face Terence Crawford, a former undisputed champion in two different weight classes. Canelo is undisputed at 168 and has won a title at 175. Crawford currently holds the WBA title at 154 pounds but knows the money game of boxing and has long eyed a huge payday versus Alvarez, the sport’s most prominent fighter.
Despite Canelo’s apprehension, the extensive wealth of the Saudi Arabian General Entertainment Authority under the direction of its chairman, Turki Alalshikh, made Canelo an offer he could not refuse and the result is a scheduled match between him and Crawford on September 13 at Allegiant Stadium in Las Vegas, which will be streamed live on Netflix.
The fight card will be produced by the Saudi Arabian-based Riyadh Season as part of its boxing series. Riyadh Season has held the two Oleksandr Usyk-Tyson Fury heavyweight title fights, the clash for the undisputed light heavyweight crown between Artur Beterbiev and Dmitry Bivol, as well as a slew of other combat sports and sports entertainment events involving the WWE, UFC and PFL.
The Canelo-Crawford megafight highlights the growing influence of Alalshikh in the combat sports world, as he purchased the iconic Ring Magazine last year from boxing Hall of Famer Oscar De La Hoya, produced the May 2 Times Square card, and will bankroll the July 12 contests between Brooklyn’s Edgar Berlanga (23-1, 18 KOs), Hamzah Sheeraz (21-0-1, 17 KOs), and Newark’s Shakur Stevenson (23-0, 11 KOs) defending his WBC lightweight belt against William Zepeda (33-0, 27 KOs) at Louis Armstrong Stadium at the USTA Billie Jean King National Tennis Center in Queens.
But boxing is not the only sport in which Saudi Arabian entities have gained traction. LIV Golf, which is financed by the Public Investment Fund, the sovereign wealth fund of Saudi Arabia, forced the PGA tour to explore a merger in June 2023 because high-profile competitors like Jon Rahm, Brooks Koepka, Dustin Johnson, and Phil Mickelson signed with the tour, founded in 2021.
The Women’s Tennis Association’s (WTA) Finals, which features the world’s top women players of the WTA Tour, signed a three-year deal to play their season-ending championship in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia from 2024 to 2026. Coco Gauff, who won the French Open last month, was last year’s WTA Finals champion.