Peters eyes Vazquez for Dunne

24 March 2009 – By Mark Doyle

Bernard Dunnes next outing could be a mouth-watering summer showdown with Israel Vazquez in Las Vegas.

The Irishman claimed the WBA super-bantamweight title with a thrilling 11th-round stoppage of Ricardo Cordoba at The O2 in Dublin on Saturday night.

Rather than pursue a soft title defence for his man, Dunnes promoter, Brian Peters, is now targeting a clash with Mexican Vazquez, who is widely regarded as the number one fighter in the world at 122lbs.

Its early days obviously and it looks like Poonsawat Kratingdaenggym could be our mandatory challenger. So I might have to fly over to Venezeula to meet up with the WBA to see exactly what the situation is with that because my preference would be Vazquez, he told the Irish Examiner.

So well have to see where we stand with Kratingdaenggym and whether we can get in a voluntary and then give him the mandatory shot.

The other possibility is that we go straight for a unification bout with IBF champion Celestino Cabellero or WBO champion Juan Manuel Lopez.

The WBCs line at the moment is that Toshiaki Nishioka is the current titleholder but that when Vazquez comes back from injury hell be the champion.

If Vazquez were the WBC champion today he would definitely be my first choice.

Vazquez has been out of action since undergoing retinal surgery shortly after his split-decision win over great rival Rafael Marquez, in March of last year.

He has since been stripped of his WBC title due to inactivity but is reportedly over the verge of a return to the ring.

Peters is now hoping that Magnifico can be tempted into a clash with his former sparring partner, Dunne.

The fact of the matter is, were in a great position here now, one that a lot of people didnt think wed be in, so we plan to take advantage of it and roll the dice, he declared.

We believed that Bernard Dunne could beat Ricardo Cordoba and we believe that he can beat Israel Vazquez.

Theres no doubt that hes a fantastic fighter and hes the marquee name in this division. But Bernards very familiar with him from his Freddie Roach days. He sparred with Vazquez and Manny Pacquiao when he was based at the Wildcard gym in California.

And why not stage it in Las Vegas? I dont see why we couldnt get a good package deal on flights and hotels over there and bring maybe a couple of thousand people over there. Ive no doubt that we could take over the MGM Grand for a night!