After Manny Pacquiao once again stunned the world and defeated Miguel Cotto to capture a world title in a 7th weight class, two things appeared inevitable: a fight with Floyd Mayweather to decide the true holder of the mythical pound-for pound title, and an almighty struggle to get it made. However, after just a few weeks of negotiations, the fight appeared all set to be signed, sealed and delivered, yet today we are left with the inexcusable replacement fights of Pacquiao-Foreman and Mayweather-Malignaggi. We've been delivered lies and conspiracies, riddles and hypocrisies before the final negative conclusion, and, in the jump, I will examine the aftermath of this whole sorry mess.

I'm not writing this post to lay the blame at the door of either Floyd Mayweather Jr or Manny Pacquaio; quite frankly, I think both men are at fault in their refusal to come to an acceptable compromise. Mayweather wants unlimited random drug testing; Pacquaio changed his demands from 30 days to 24 days - ultimately, neither fighter showed such a strong desire to fight one another to come to an agreement. Sure, they couldn't care less about what the millions of people at home think about this fight, but the fact that $40 million each was at stake makes this stink even more.

We are now left with Pacquaio-Foreman for an alphabet title at 154 lbs, and an entirely meaningless Mayweather-Malignaggi fight at welterweight. Quite frankly, I will not applaud Pacquiao as an 8 weight division champion should he win the fight, as it will no doubt be fought at a catchweight and features him fighting the least experienced and least dangerous paper titlist in the division. Mayweather-Malignaggi is effectively an exhibition fight: no one is going to laud Floyd as the undisputed pound-for-pound king should he beat a bloated light welterweight who has lost his two biggest fights and only managed to salvage his reputation by defeating a bloated lightweight.

The Man who is ultimately left out in the cold is 'Sugar' Shane Mosley. Having knocked out the seemingly unbreakable Tijuanan Tornado in January, Mosley appealed for fights against both Mayweather and Pacquaio. Pacquaio stated he did not want to fight at welterweight (despite Mosley going on record as saying he would willingly drop down to 140), and then subsequently fought Cotto. Mayweather dodged him - of that there is no doubt. Mosley faces Andre Berto in 23 days on World Championship Boxing, without the PPV date that he undoubtedly deserves, while Mayweather faces Malignaggi and Pacquaio faces Foreman in arguably easier challenges.

And so, it is us, the fans, who loyally fork out of our own pockets (I don't live in America, but I pay to watch Amir Khan fight, so I understand how it feels), who have been cheated out of the biggest fights boxing had to offer. The three best welterweights in the world, arguably the three best pound-for-pound fighters in the world, will not fight one another: whether it was Mayweather-Mosley, Mosley-Pacquaio or Mayweather-Pacquiao, all were huge - and it appears we won't get to see one of them.