{"id":807200,"date":"2026-07-18T00:56:12","date_gmt":"2026-07-18T00:56:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/807200\/"},"modified":"2026-07-18T00:56:12","modified_gmt":"2026-07-18T00:56:12","slug":"terence-crawford-says-theres-only-one-man-he-wishes-he-faced-the-fight-that-got-away","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/807200\/","title":{"rendered":"Terence Crawford says there’s only one man he wishes he faced: “The fight that got away”"},"content":{"rendered":"

Terence Crawford<\/a> has named a Hall of Famer he was supposed to face in 2021, only for their showdown to fall by the way side.<\/p>\n

Ultimately, \u2018Bud\u2019 has no regrets about how his career unfolded, especially with him becoming a three-division undisputed champion against Canelo Alvarez<\/a> last September.<\/p>\n

At the same time, though, there is seemingly a shred of disappointment that his blockbuster clash with Manny Pacquiao never quite materialised.<\/p>\n

The pair were closing in on an agreement to collide in June 2025, back when Crawford had just successfully defended his WBO welterweight title against Kell Brook.<\/p>\n

Pacquiao, meanwhile, was coming off a WBA title defence against Keith Thurman<\/a>, who he defeated by split decision after scoring a first-round knockdown.<\/p>\n

A unification match with Crawford was then becoming increasingly likely, only for financial backers in Abu Dhabi to pull the plug on their investment.<\/p>\n

Speaking with ESPN<\/a>, Crawford named the eight-division world champion as the only fighter, past or present, that he was eager to test himself against.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe only fight I felt got away from me is the Pacquiao fight. But all the fighters before me \u2013 I don\u2019t ever look at them and think, \u2018I want to fight him\u2019. I was just happy to watch them and learn from them.\u201d<\/p>\n

Following the collapse of his fight with Crawford, Pacquiao was supposed to face Errol Spence Jr, the then-WBC and IBF welterweight champion, in August 2021.<\/p>\n

With Spence pulling out due to a torn retina, however, \u2018Pac Man\u2019 ended up facing Yordenis Ugas and lost his title via a unanimous decision.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Terence Crawford has named a Hall of Famer he was supposed to face in 2021, only for their…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":807201,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[571],"tags":[64,63,802,85],"class_list":["post-807200","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-boxing","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-boxing","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/807200","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=807200"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/807200\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/807201"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=807200"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=807200"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=807200"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}