Josh Taylor has questioned Teofimo Lopez's mental strength in the build up to their world title fight; Taylor will put his WBO super-lightweight championship on the line against Lopez in New York on June 10; Taylor vs Lopez will be live on Sky Sports
Monday 10 April 2023 07:56, UK
When Josh Taylor travelled to America to announce his next fight, he was expecting to face off with opponent Teofimo Lopez.
Taylor was ringside at Shakur Stevenson's victory over Shuichiro Yoshino at the Prudential Center in Newark on Saturday.
On the live broadcast he announced he would put his WBO super-lightweight championship on the line against Brooklyn's Teofimo Lopez on June 10 at the Madison Square Garden Theater in New York, live on Sky Sports.
Scotland's Taylor was hoping to go head to head in person with his challenger, though Lopez in fact made his appearance by video link.
As far as the champion's concerned that's a victory for him in the first skirmish when it comes to pre-fight mind games.
"I've come over here to say hello to him and he's went away hiding," Taylor told Sky Sports.
"I flew over halfway across the world to come say hello to him and pull him up really. See what are you going to say, what time is it? But he's not here. He's not showed up. He's got no backside.
"He can't hide too much longer. We've got eight, nine weeks left, I'll just have to wait till then or when the press conference is."
He takes that as another sign Lopez is not as confident as he appears to be.
"A little bit of bravado, a sort of front and then you see the fragility of him on camera in his last couple of fights," Taylor said.
"So you can see he's a little bit fragile and a little bit mentally weak. So I can definitely use that to my advantage."
Lopez was a unified lightweight world champion. But he did appear to question himself after his second fight at super-lightweight last time out against Sandor Martin.
"He might be doubting himself, maybe thinking I'm not as good as I thought I was or as big and strong as I thought I was. Putting a lot of pressure on himself by talking so much nonsense that he talks, him and his dad," Taylor suggested.
"Putting a lot of pressure on his own shoulders. So I think that's maybe got to him a bit in recent times.
"I do think he's a little bit fragile mentally sometimes. Yes I do."
Though Taylor pointed out: "You take these things with a pinch of salt. What really matters is when you get in the ring. But you can definitely size him up and get inside his head before the fight and you can plant little seeds and doubts in their mind before the fight starts.
"I've not had that opportunity this time to see him. I'm not really too fussed about playing mind games and all that kind of stuff. It doesn't work with myself anyway. I just take it as it comes."
He however knows that Lopez is an elite fighter. He beat Vasiliy Lomachenko, a pound-for-pound star, at lightweight and, after one upset loss to George Kambosos, Lopez has a lot to prove at super-lightweight too.
Lopez is highly dangerous.
"I am preparing for the best version of Teofimo Lopez and the best version of Teofimo Lopez is a very good fighter," Taylor said.
"I'm preparing for a hard 12 rounds as always, I'm looking forward to it. I'm looking forward to coming in there and facing the version that beat Lomachenko and that version is a very good Teofimo Lopez."
