McJoe Arroyo has a little bit of knowledge involving the storied ring rivalry between his native Puerto Rico and the Philippines that he intends to maintain his nation’s superiority when he defends the World Boxing Organization super-flyweight title this Saturday.
Jerwin Ancajas will be looking to join Manny Pacquiao as one of just a handful of Filipino fighters to score a win over a Puerto Rican when he meets Arroyo at the Philippine Navy Gymnasium in Taguig.
But Arroyo, who arrived in Manila on Monday morning after a 24-hour flying time, has vowed to return home to San Juan with the WBO 115-lb belt still strapped around his waist.
“This is a job that I have to do and I came here focused on just one thing: winning,” said the 30-year-old Arroyo during a late afternoon workout at the Elorde Sports Center on Sucat Road, Parañaque.
Arroyo’s two-hour workout was supervised by his trainers Anthony Otero and Alex Caraballo and chief handler Peter Rivera, who is a second-timer on Philippine soil as he had been here many years ago to attend the birthday celebration of Manny Pacquiao.
Arroyo says he has studied Ancajas and that he is ready for whatever the Davao banger will bring to the ring.
“I look at every opponent as someone not to be taken lightly and I make sure that I adjust to whatever an opponent comes up with,” said Arroyo, who had won the vacant WBO title by beating another Filipino, King Arthur Villanueva, last year in El Paso, Texas.
The title fight will be open to the public as a fistic treat of Pacquiao, now a senator and busy preparing for a comeback fight in November.