Galahad and Wood stoke the flames for possible featherweight title fight
The two standout featherweights are putting some heat behind a possible showdown.
There may be a featherweight title fight — and possibly even a unification — brewing between Kid Galahad and Leigh Wood.
Galahad (28-1, 17 KO) won the vacant IBF title by stopping Jazza Dickens after 11 rounds on Aug. 7, a week after Wood (25-2, 15 KO) upset Xu Can to win the WBA’s secondary “world” title.
The idea of unification is a tricky one, because the WBA seem to go pick and choose when to allow secondary “world” titlists to unify, as they do with most things, and they still rather hilariously recognize Leo Santa Cruz as their “super world” champion at 126 lbs, despite the fact Santa Cruz hasn’t fought in that division since Feb. 2019, and has since won and lost their “super world” title at 130, which is another ridiculous story in and of itself.
Santa Cruz represents bigger purses than Xu Can did and Leigh Wood now does, which means bigger sanctioning fees for the WBA to collect. He’s also simply a bigger star than either of them, and he has a money machine behind him in Premier Boxing Champions.
But if Leo does vacate at some point, or the WBA make what would be a clearly well overdue decision to strip him (or name him “champion-in-recess”), a Galahad-Wood fight could unify belts.
If not, Galahad already has other ideas about a fight that is percolating a bit after some trash talk on social media.
“If Leigh Wood is serious, tell him to vacate that Mickey Mouse belt and I’ll fight him next for my world title,” Galahad said on Twitter. “If he really wants this smoke we can do it in November!”
Wood fired back, “Have your defense in Sheffield first, let Eddie (Hearn) give away 80 percent of the tickets so it looks full. And you can bring them feather hands to Nottingham (next) summer.”
Galahad brought up the fact that Wood lost to Dickens in early 2020, while Wood stayed focused on what he sees as the current standing of things.
“Imagine thinking you’re the shot caller with that regular strap!” Galahad replied. “Feather hands? How did you get on against Jazza, pal?”
“You couldn’t sell out a leisure centre, ‘pal,’” Wood said. “Showed your level against Josh (Warrington), sent half of ringside to sleep. You need me more than I need you.”
Galahad’s post-fight interview on DAZN a few weeks back was noteworthy for how quickly he shot down any fight ideas promoter Eddie Hearn, standing to his right, might have brought up, leaving Hearn without much to say, which is very difficult to do. Included in that was not seeming particularly interested in a fight with Wood.
But when you look at the featherweight landscape, Galahad-Wood is a fight that makes as much sense as any. We’ve got both in the top five at the weight right now, and it’s unlikely that they’re going to get Gary Russell Jr or Emanuel Navarrete. A fight with Mauricio Lara or Josh Warrington could be set up after their Sept. 4 rematch, but past that they’re pretty clearly the biggest and best fight for one another at the moment.