'In the big time now' - Cacace eyes lightweight title shot after Wembley win

IBF super-featherweight champion Anthony Cacace says he is in the "big time now" as he considers moving up to lightweight to challenge Vasiliy Lomachenko after beating Josh Warrington at Wembley.

Cacace, whose world title was not on the line, secured a unanimous decision win over two-time featherweight champion Warrington as he backed up his stunning victory over Joe Cordina in May.

While Eduardo 'Sugar' Nunez is Cacace's mandatory challenger at super-featherweight, the Belfast fighter outlined his ambitions in the heavier class against the likes of four-time world champion Lomachenko or Gervonta Davis.

"I'm in that league, I'm right there for any of those boys," Cacace said of a potential lightweight bout in the United States.

"If I move up to lightweight, I'm the mandatory challenger for Lomachenko's title. We're just going to have to see. It's all in my hands. I'm in the driving seat.

"We'll see what the future holds."

Having beaten Cordina to claim the IBF super-featherweight crown in May, Cacace was primed to defend his title against Warrington, who was stepping up from featherweight after losing his last two contests against Luis Alberto Lopez and Leigh Wood.

While Cacace looked in control early on against Cordina, it took him a while to find his range against the 33-year-old Yorkshireman.

Ultimately, though, Cacace grew into the fight and looked comfortable for much of it.

"He was very strong and very intelligent," 35-year-old Cacace said of Warrington, who appeared to signal his intent to retire after laying down his gloves in the ring following the fight.

"He had definitely done his homework on me. He was holding me from the left-hand side so I couldn't get the right uppercut or the right hook.

"But he's a two-time world champion. He's got a great team behind him, Sean O'Hagan his father and the rest of the people around him are all clued in. I didn't expect anything less, to be honest - I expected a hard fight and that's what I got."

Cacace and Warrington's fight was one of the undercard contests for Saturday night's main event which saw Daniel Dubois knock out fellow Briton Anthony Joshua to retain the IBF heavyweight title.

Cacace's win came with Wembley still some way short of the 96,000-strong crowd that watched Oasis frontman Liam Gallagher's three-song set and a scintillating headline fight.

But it is still the grandest stage Cacace has graced and he said it was "amazing" to deliver another big win for the Irish boxing community.

"I'm a proud Andersonstown man and I'm very proud of my estate and the people around it, but not only that - the whole of Belfast; north, south, east, west and the whole of Ireland.

"I'm just super proud to be Irish and to be doing them all proud."

Cacace, who paid tribute to the support of his team and family after another big win, added that he is living a dream having come from relative obscurity to the heights of a Wembley win in the space of 18 months.

"If you were to ask me this a year-and-a-half-ago, I'd have dismissed it as silly talk.

"Now it's real talk and we're all in the big time and we want to continue marching forward."