Saul ‘Canelo’ Alvarez and Gennady Golovkin both seeking brutal end to rivalry with each man sensing weakness in the other

A four-year wait comes to an end on Saturday as Saul ‘Canelo’ Alvarez and Gennady Golovkin are reunited for a trilogy that boxing didn’t quite need but will gladly accept.

Memories of their first encounter in 2017 have never truly faded. Golovkin, then a 35-year-old granite-chinned monster with zero defeats on his record, had seemingly done enough to cement his status as the best pound-for-pound fighter on the planet – including eating the sort of brain-numbing shot that flattened Amir Khan and broke Billy Joe Saunders’ eye socket in one memorable ninth round moment.

‘I let it get through. It wasn’t, I don’t what to call it – it wasn’t hard,’ the hard-hitting Kazakh later recalled. ‘It felt kind of like a slap, I guess.’

A split decision draw was called out shortly after, a decision that dismayed boxing fans across the globe with judge Adelaide Byrd, who inexplicably awarded Golovkin just two rounds on her 118-110 scorecard, later asked to explain her decision.

The rematch followed a year later with Canelo slugging his way to a majority decision victory although the verdict was again without its critics.

Since then, his status as the best in the game has been largely unquestioned.

After defending his middleweight crown against Daniel Jacobs and winning light-heavyweight gold after knocking out Sergey Kovlaev in 2019, his imperious march saw him condemn three previously undefeated fighters to first losses in the space of 11 months as he set about conquering the super-middleweight division.

Callum Smith, Billy Joe Saunders and Caleb Plant surrendered their WBA, WBO and IBF titles as they fell to the Mexican’s combination of sublime ringcraft, ferocious power and measured patience. Many began to wonder who could stop him.

Perhaps