Mayweather challenges Pacquiao to May 5 bout

CALISTUS KOLANTSHO
Correspondent | Thursday January 12, 2012 00:00

Mayweather and Pacquiao are boxing's top two stars and they have circled each other warily for more than two years.

Both have said they're eager to fight, yet neither has agreed to a deal for what's likely to be the most lucrative bout in boxing history.

Mayweather has stepped up his campaign since Pacquiao's narrow win over Juan Manuel M‡rquez last November, culminating in Tuesday's gauntlet-throwing.

'Manny Pacquiao I'm calling you out let's fight May 5 and give the world what they want to see,' he wrote.

'My Jail Sentence was pushed back because the date was locked in.

Step up Punk.'

Mayweather first proposed the date last November, when his adviser Leonard Ellerbe revealed that they had booked the MGM Grand in Las Vegas. The promoter Richard Schaefer, chief executive of Golden Boy Promotions, said: 'We have informed the pay-per-view industry and I have the arena on hold.' The bout seemed unlikely to take place until last week, when a Las Vegas judge agreed to postpone Mayweather's jail sentence in a domestic violence case until June. Pacquiao has yet to respond to Mayweather's challenge and his last Twitter update was almost a month ago.