John Murray confirms world title fight against Brandon Rios

Murray goes to New York on the back of his defeat by Kevin Mitchell in July

Former European lightweight champion John Murray has confirmed he will fight Brandon Rios for his WBA title in New York City on 3 December.

Murray lost his last fight to Londoner Kevin Mitchell in July after suffering an eighth-round stoppage.

The Manchester fighter recently split with coach Joe Gallagher but said he was thrilled to be fighting Rios.

"I'm going to be in phenomenal condition," Murray told BBC Radio Manchester.

It will be Murray's first world title fight and will feature on the undercard for the rematch of Miguel Angel Cotto defending his WBA light middleweight title against Antonio Margarito at Madison Square Garden.

The 26-year-old said: "I'm over the moon at the minute, I'm ready to go to work and bring back that title. It's a massive challenge, but it gets the fire in the belly going. I've been in training for four weeks already, I'm going over there to win this."

Until his defeat by Mitchell, Murray held the longest unbeaten professional record in Britain, having won his first 31 fights. He confirmed he would like a rematch with Mitchell in 2012.

Mitchell was also reported to have wanted to fight Mexican-American Rios, who is unbeaten in 29 fights. He has a record of 28 wins and one draw.

Of his split with Gallagher Murray said: "It was a massive decision, I started with Joe when I was 14 years old as an amateur. I felt the timing was right, as in the last couple of fights I've felt a bit one-dimensional.

"The time was right to do something new, to freshen things up."