(CNN)- Mexican superstar Saul “Canelo” Alvarez will defend his World Boxing Council (WBC), World Boxing Association (WBA) and World Boxing Organization super middleweight championships against undefeated Edgar Berlanga this Saturday.
The pair will face off at the T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas. The main card is set to begin at 8:00 PM ET and you can find out how to watch it live here.
This fight holds special meaning for Alvarez as it takes place during Mexican Independence Day weekend.
“I’m grateful for the support they (Mexican fans) give me,” Alvarez told CNNE’s Gonzalo Alvarado in an interview. “I feel honored to represent my country, to represent them, and I hope you enjoy the fight on Saturday.”
Alvarez enters Saturday’s fight as the heavy favorite and with an impressive 61-2-2 record. The only two losses in his career were against the great Floyd Mayweather Jr. 11 years ago and a surprise loss to Russian Dmitry Bivol in 2022 after briefly moving up to light heavyweight.
The 34-year-old became the first undisputed champion at the super middleweight level in 2021 when he defeated Caleb Plant via 11th-round TKO and held the distinction until July 2024, when he was stripped of his Federation Boxing International (IBF) title for refusing a mandatory fight against William Scull.
“Canelo” Alvarez will now face the powerful Berlanga.
“He’s a good fighter,” he said of his opponent. “He’s young, he’s strong. But I have a lot of experience, a lot of talent.”
The Mexican described himself as “100% ready” for the fight and expressed his desire to defeat Berlanga after three years in his last fight against Plant.
“I’m going to do everything I can to (win the fight) this way,” he said.
Berlanga, 27, a Brooklyn-born man of Puerto Rican descent, has not entered his first title fight as a favorite, describing it as “the biggest fight of my life” and stressing the need to “work smarter, not harder.”
“This fight is all about IQ and intelligence,” he told CNN. “It’s nothing physical. “We have prepared very well mentally for this fight and that is the most important thing.”
Berlanga has it won all his 22 battles The professional, with 17 of his wins coming by way of knockout, said he is aware of the task ahead but is certainly not short on confidence ahead of Saturday.
“You can’t go out there with a guy like him and think you’re going to throw a bomb and swing to knock him out,” he explained. “You’ve got to build it up, you’ve got to take him to deep water.”
“The fight will have three segments. In the first four rounds he will come out and feel me out. The second segment of the fight is when it starts, this is when we will go back and forth. The third segment of the fight is when I am going to take control.
Berlanga is known for hitting hard and could potentially cause problems for Alvarez with his power, although the Mexican is notorious as a counterpuncher and has never been officially knocked down in any of his 65 fights. However, that hasn’t stopped Berlanga from expressing a desire to make history in the fight.
“I want to knock him out in the sixth round,” he said. “That’s boxing. I’m a better puncher than him, I like the knockout, so you know what’s going to happen to me.
“I want to finish him off, I want to surprise the world, I want to put him on my back. I want to show the world that anything is possible with me,” he said.
