'I feel that I was the winner': Canelo Alvarez wants Gennady Golovkin rematch as first fight of 2018

Canelo Alvarez has spoken out in public for the first time about a potential rematch with Gennady Golovkin following their fight on 16 September in Las Vegas.

The two middleweight fighters fought to a controversial split-decision draw as many felt "GGG" had just about won the contest.

Talks of a rematch were set in motion with Canelo initially suggesting May as the month for a potential sequel between the two following the fight.

With discussions between the two camps having recently begun, there were fears in the Golovkin camp that the Mexican would hesitate and take too long to accept a rematch as he had allegedly done for their initial meeting.

However, Canelo has assured the combat world that he wants his very first fight of the new year to be against the Kazakh, speaking at the annual convention of the World Boxing Association in Colombia.

"I want it to be my first fight of 2018," Canelo said, as quoted on BoxingScene. "I do not want another fight that is not the tiebreaker with Golovkin, and that's what we're going to try to do."

Canelo's camp received a lot of criticism as many felt judge Adelaide Byrd's scorecard of 118-110 was extremely favourable for the 27-year-old.

Some boxers have gone as far as to say that the only reason Golovkin did not win the decision was because of Oscar Del La Hoya, who promoted both the fight and Canelo, controls the sport.

Canelo though, still feels he won the contest.

"I feel that I was the winner, but that's boxing," Canelo added. "I told everyone that it would be a great fight, I feel very happy with what I did, the people were happy and now they want to see the rematch."

Meanwhile, the first fight is reported to have generated 1.3m pay-per-view buys according to the Los Angeles Times, which sets it as Golovkin's most successful event while it is the second-most successful event for Canelo after his majority decision loss to Floyd Mayweather.