As we near the September 16 super fight between Saúl “Canelo” Álvarez and Gennady “GGG” Golovkin, it’s not just the boxing world that’s hyped for this once in a lifetime event. Canelo posted a video to his Facebook page on Friday, showing celebrities from Mexico and all of Latin America showing support for the Mexican boxer ahead of one of the biggest fights of his life.
From the world of sports–Chicharito Hernández and Adrían González pay their respects–to Hollywood–Jane the Virgin‘s Jaime Camil and How To Get Away With Murder‘s Karla Souza, rocking a “Mexicana” shirt–and even to Carlos Slim Domit, these megastars had one message for Mexico’s most famous boxer: “estamos contigo, Canelo.” The #MexicoConCanelo clip features dozens of messages of support, interspersed with clips of Canelo’s most vicious knockouts, his training montages, and, perhaps more inspirationally, clips of him meeting and greeting fans.
It’s not just Mexicans getting in on it, either; Venezuelan TV personality Wilder Valderrama and Chilean actor Cristián de la Fuente also shout out Canelo, while former Nickelodeon star and musician Drake Bell pops up rather surprisingly, voicing his support in Spanish for the Mexican boxing idol. The video was masterminded by Nadia Sepulveda from Canelo’s team, while Camil himself helped reach out and secure the clips from the celebrities wishing Canelo good luck.
It’s interesting to see the wave of support for Canelo, especially as he goes into a fight where a foreign boxer has so captured the hearts of the Mexican fanbase. GGG fights in what has traditionally been called the “Mexican Style,” one that Canelo himself has rejected in favor of a counter-punching, more defensive way of fighting. The build-up to the fight has seen that as the main contradiction at play: Mexicans want to support a boxer of their own, while also respecting Golovkin’s embrace of Mexican style and culture.