Frampton won the first fight in New York last summer before the featherweight rivals met again in January with Santa Cruz levelling up the score at one apiece. At the time of the result of their rematch, Frampton and his team had asked Santa Cruz to consider a rubber match in Belfast, something which was never dismissed out of hand.
Should the Irishman harbour ambitions of beating Santa Cruz again though, it seems Frampton will be forced to travel for the third time in succession due to the Mexican-American’s father Jose’s apprehension.
“If he (my father) says no, I wouldn’t go there. I do what he tells me,” Santa Cruz told Villainfy Media
“My dad is scared that if I go over there, and even if I beat Carl Frampton, the people and the judges are going to be an influence.
“He thinks that even if I beat him I’ll have the victory taken away from me.
“My dad says not to go over there, because it would be a really bad decision and, you know, he is right and everything. But if I go over there and I get the win and beat him, for all the fans to see that I win, that’s all that matters. Hopefully they see that I win and they give me that.
“It’s very important, he’s my father, he’s been there my whole life, my whole career. I always listen to my dad,” he added.
Barry McGuigan, Frampton’s manager and promoter, was leading calls for a trilogy offering at home and may now decide to pull the plug on another meeting in order to go in another direction entirely.
