With a report from AP
Manny Pacquiao’s contract with Top Rank will run until the middle of 2018, according to Hall of Fame promoter Bob Arum, who assures the Filipino star that a rematch with Australian tormentor Jeff Horn promises to become a box office hit.
“He can make a lot of money (fighting Horn in a rematch),” Arum told the Bulletin from the US yesterday, noting that Top Rank has promotional control “up to the middle of next year.”
However, Arum, 85, insists that a second meeting largely depends on whether Pacquiao wants to fight again.
“It’s all up to him and in two weeks I will be coming over (to the Philippines) and discuss with him and his wife Jinkee,” Arum said.
Pacquiao dropped a 12-round unanimous decision to Horn before a mammoth crowd of over 51,000 at Suncorp Stadium in Brisbane, Australia.
Horn, according to Arum, “is contractually obligated” to grant Pacquiao a rematch and the newly-crowned World Boxing Organization welterweight king has expressed willingness and the desire to do it.
If Pacquiao decides to fight again, a Horn rematch can take place in “November or December,” added Arum, who will team up anew with Duco Promotions and the Queensland State Government in holding the fight.
In an interview with Manila-based scribes upon his arrival from Australia early this week, Pacquiao insists that the Horn fight was “his last fight” under Arum.
RESULT STANDS
Meantime, World Boxing Organization said in Brisbane that it will re-score the Pacquiao-Horn fight because of the contentious unanimous decision awarded to the Australian challenger, but there is no plan to change the result.