{"id":436324,"date":"2026-02-20T15:31:08","date_gmt":"2026-02-20T15:31:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/436324\/"},"modified":"2026-02-20T15:31:08","modified_gmt":"2026-02-20T15:31:08","slug":"ibf-orders-albert-bell-vs-andy-cruz-lightweight-eliminator","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/436324\/","title":{"rendered":"IBF orders Albert Bell vs Andy Cruz lightweight eliminator"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"duet--article--dangerously-set-cms-markup duet--article--standard-paragraph _1nfb3k4i _16w9vov1 _16w9vov0 ls9zuh1\">Andy Cruz\u2019s road back to a title shot could be shorter than expected, as Jake Donovan <a href=\"https:\/\/www.boxingscene.com\/articles\/albert-bell-andy-cruz-ibf-135lbs-title-eliminator-formally-ordered\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">reports<\/a> that the IBF has ordered him to face unbeaten Albert Bell in a final eliminator.<\/p>\n<p class=\"duet--article--dangerously-set-cms-markup duet--article--standard-paragraph _1nfb3k4i _16w9vov1 _16w9vov0 ls9zuh1\">Cruz (6-1, 3 KO), whose ludicrous amateur pedigree prompted a fast-tracked pro career, is <a href=\"https:\/\/www.badlefthook.com\/boxing-news\/112683\/raymon-muratalla-pulls-out-majority-decision-over-andy-cruz-boxing-news-2026\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">coming off a terrific losing effort against reigning champion Raymond Muratalla<\/a> in one of the better fights of 2026. Tossing losers right back into eliminators is a pet peeve of mine, but between the fact that Cruz just barely came up short and the fact that Lucas Bahdi initially got the call to meet Bell (28-0, 9 KO), this one\u2019s more tolerable than most.<\/p>\n<p class=\"duet--article--dangerously-set-cms-markup duet--article--standard-paragraph _1nfb3k4i _16w9vov1 _16w9vov0 ls9zuh1\">\u201cPrince\u201d spent a goodly amount of time as the WBO\u2019s top contender at 130, but the sanctioning body never wound up calling his number, prompting a move to 135 following a year-long layoff. He\u2019s 2-0 at his new weight, taking all 20 rounds on all six scorecards and securing one of the IBF\u2019s many trinkets to secure his top spot in the rankings.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Andy Cruz\u2019s road back to a title shot could be shorter than expected, as Jake Donovan reports that&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":436325,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[41],"tags":[2560,6102,101,56,54,55],"class_list":["post-436324","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-boxing","tag-boxing","tag-boxing-news","tag-sports","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/436324","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=436324"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/436324\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/436325"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=436324"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=436324"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=436324"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}