Michael Magnesi moves up to lightweight for planned 2026 return

Michael Magnesi will move up to the lightweight division for the next stage of his professional boxing career. The Italian fighter is expected to return before the end of 2026 at the 135-pound limit, beginning a new phase after a review with his coaching team.

The change was agreed by Magnesi and the members of Team Magnesi as they reshape his career plan. The new direction is intended to create a path towards bigger challenges and contests against leading fighters on the international scene.

Magnesi’s long-term target has not changed. He still wants to win the World Boxing Council’s Green and Gold Belt, while the team is assessing a gradual route that could include opportunities at European and world level.

A European title challenge is among the intermediate options being considered. That route would give Magnesi a major championship platform before any move towards the highest-profile international opportunities, although no specific opponent or contest has been confirmed.

The restructuring has also brought Paul O’Neill into the team as head nutritionist. Magnesi travelled to the United Kingdom on August 11 and 12 with his longtime trainer Aglioti and promoter and wife Alessandra Branco, completing physical evaluations and tests as the new weight-management and conditioning programme was prepared.

Branco said the team had been developing wider plans to reinforce Magnesi’s career and indicated that another member would soon be added to the group. The identity of that recruit has not yet been disclosed, leaving the lightweight move and the new preparation programme as the first confirmed elements of the boxer’s next chapter.