A rival of Katie Taylor has accused the Bray woman of running scared of the biggest fights.
Puerto Rican Amanda Serrano believes Taylor has dodged a fight with her and a rematch with Delfine Persoon by 'fleeing' the lightweight division.
Taylor takes on Christina Linardatou for the WBO world light welterwight title next month in Manchester, as she bids to become a two-weight world champion.
But Serrano, who has long been mooted as a potential opponent for Taylor, believes the Olympic gold medalist has shirked the bigger challenges.
“Honestly, my opinion, I believe that Katie Taylor, she’s fighting this fight [v Linardatou], she left the division – 135lbs – because there was two good fights there,” Serrano said on Matchroom’s Born Champion series.”
“There was the rematch [with Persoon] and there was a fight with Amanda Serrano. She fled the whole division completely! And I’m like, ‘Wait, where is she going?'”
Taylor beat Amanda's older sister Cindy via unanimous decision last year - and the younger Serrano sister would relish the chance the to gain revenge.
She said: “I mean, of course it would be awesome, like me versus Katie Taylor — that’s the fight everybody wants.
“I had presented to me in the beginning of 2019 a three-fight deal, the last one being against Katie Taylor [at] year end. But we’re here, almost year end. I fought September. She’s fighting November but whole different person, and in a whole other weight class.
"So I’m like, ‘Okay’. I mean, nothing really big happened to me in my fight with Heather Hardy, and I was willing and able to come and fight her in November, but I mean… I don’t know.
“Another great fight — we want to see the rematch: Katie Taylor versus [Delfine] Persoon. I mean, I think Persoon deserves [the rematch] — she was the [WBC] champion.
"She deserves that rematch. But like I said, Katie Taylor fled to a whole other weight division, and she wants to accomplish her own goal of becoming a two-division undisputed champion; she wants to go and be the undisputed champion at 140, which means she has to fight three girls to become the undisputed champion.”
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