Notebook: GGG returns, riffs on Murata, facing him in Japan, fight delays & Canelo

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Middleweight titleholder Gennadiy Golovkin will turn 40 on Friday but he has no plans on retiring just yet, especially with at least two significant bouts in front of him.

“I am going to be 40 on Friday but I feel good. I will continue fighting as long as I feel good and can train hard to fight at the level I have come to expect of myself,” Golovkin said. “Living a healthy lifestyle keeps me feeling good, strong.”

The first of those major fights is a 160-pound title unification fight when IBF titlist Golovkin will square off with WBA belt holder Ryota Murata on Saturday at the Saitama Super Arena in Saitama, Japan, which is just outside of Murata’s hometown of Tokyo.

It is a long-delayed bout that was originally scheduled for Dec. 29 at the same arena but postponed in early December because of the surge of the Omicron variant of Covid-19.

Coverage of the card on DAZN begins at 5:10 a.m. ET with the main event at approximately 8:10 a.m. ET.

If GGG defeats Murata, and Canelo Alvarez, the undisputed super middleweight champion and GGG’s greatest rival, handles light heavyweight titlist Dmitry Bivol on May 7, Alvarez would return to super middleweight and defend against Golovkin in September in their third fight following two highly controversial decisions that have Alvarez up 1-0-1 in an intense rivalry but with many believing GGG should be 2-0.

But first up is the fight with fellow two-time titlist Murata, 36, who became a national hero in Japan after winning a 2012 Olympic gold medal. He is also somebody Golovkin knows and respects from their time training together years ago.