Leo Santa Cruz reveals new reason for not wanting to come to Belfast

He may have gone back on his original promise and refused to face Carl Frampton [23(14)-1(0)] in Belfast this Summer, but Leo Santa Cruz has promised that a rubber match with ‘The Jackal’ will take place in the future.

However, the Mexican-American three-weight world champion has revealed another reason behind his unwillingness to come to the Titanic City.

Frampton and Santa Cruz are locked at one apiece following two titanic battles in the past twelve months, with Frampton winning a majority decision and the WBA featherweight title in New York last July, before Santa Cruz returned the favour and reclaimed the belt in January in Las Vegas.

Prior to their Sin City seconds, Santa Cruz [33(18)-1(0)-1] promised at a Belfast press conference that he would return to the city for a deciding bout this Summer.

However, in the aftermath of the fight in January, Santa Cruz would cool talk of a third clash in Belfast before flatly rejecting the idea – citing his father and trainer, José, who feared that ‘El Terremoto’ would be on the wrong end of a hometown decision if he were to travel to Frampton’s backyard.

Now however, Santa Cruz has claimed that a major issue in his unwillingness to travel to Belfast is due to non-specified difficulties in securing a visa for his father.

Santa Cruz told Villainfy Media that “I know, later on down the line, that I’m going to fight him [Frampton] again. We can make the third fight happen. I’m pretty confident [that a third fight will happen]. I want it, he wants it.”

“It’s a matter of coming to an agreement and fixing my dad a permit so he could go over there to Ireland. One of the reasons is that. I do want to go over there but, my dad, he can’t no visa or anything, that’s one of the problems.”

Frampton will fight in Belfast this Summer regardless in a homecoming fight at Windsor Park, with an announcement regarding the opponent due in the very near future.

Watch Leo Santa Cruz’s interview with Villainfy in full below:

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