Gennady Golovkin may step up in weight to face veteran Hopkins

Middleweight kingpin Gennady Golovkin could provide the opposition for Bernard Hopkins' final bout.

The unbeaten Kazakh (34-0-KO31), defends his WBA, IBF and WBC (interim) world titles against mandatory challenger Dominic Wade on April 23 and wants to face WBC champion Saul 'Canelo' Alvarez later in the year.

But with the Mexican due to face Amir Khan in May and not certain to agree to a deal thereafter, Golovkin's team have revealed they are considering making a fight with veteran American Hopkins (55-7-2-KO32), who has been campaigning at light-heavyweight.

Bernard is a legend within the sport. But we have to get this IBF mandatory out of the way and we would always consider that. Tom Loeffler

In an interview reported on boxingscene.com, Golovkin's promoter Tom Loeffler said: "I've always said that if there's a middleweight champion willing to fight him, it's always going to be the priority.

"If Billy Joe Saunders isn't going to fight, if Canelo isn't going to fight, we would consider a marketable name at 168lbs and Hopkins is more active than Andre Ward, so it makes sense.

'Canelo' Alvarez will face Amir Khan in May

"It's an interesting fight. Bernard is a legend within the sport. But we have to get this IBF mandatory out of the way and we would always consider that."

Philadelphia's Hopkins, now 51 years old, unified the middleweight division in 2004 when he beat Oscar De La Hoya and was last in action in November 2014 when he lost a unanimous decision to world light-heavyweight champion Sergey Kovalev.