Proposed Alexander-Maidana bout targeted for next year

Former WBC/IBF junior welterweight titleholder Devon Alexander and fellow 140-pound contender Marcos Maidana have agreed to a welterweight fight that is being targeted for February.

The hard-hitting, 28-year-old Maidana (31-2, 27 KOs) is coming off fourth-round knockout of Peter Petrov (29-3-1, 13 KOs) in September, his second straight win since rising from a first-round knockdown during a unanimous decision loss to WBA/IBF junior welterweight beltholder Amir Khan (26-1, 18 KOs) last December.

The 24-year-old Alexander (22-1, 13 KOs) lost his WBC junior welterweight belt following an 11th-round technical decision loss to Tim Bradley (27-0, 11 KOs) in January, but bounced back with a 10-round decision win over hard-hitting RING No. 5-rated junior welterweight Lucas Matthysse (28-2, 26 KOs) of Argentina in June.

Prior to facing Bradley, Alexander struggled through a decision over former titleholder Andriy Kotelnik in August of 2009, and claimed that extreme weight loss contributed to what he considers to have been less-than-stellar efforts against Kotelnik, Bradley and Matthysse.

Kotelnik scored a split-decision victory over Maidana in Febraury of 2007.

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Lem Satterfield can be reached at lemuel.satterfield@gmail.com