Brian Castano made it perfectly clear that he isn’t looking past Patrick Teixeira.

Castano is a 6-1 favorite entering their fight Saturday night, but Teixeira is the defending WBO junior middleweight champion. The Brazilian southpaw also is undefeated (5-0) since his second-round, technical-knockout loss to Curtis Stevens in May 2016 encouraged Teixeira to move back down to the 154-pound division from the middleweight ranks.

Argentina’s Castano cannot help, however, thinking about the higher-profile fight he can secure by beating Teixeira in their 12-round, 154-pound championship match at Fantasy Springs Resort Casino in Indio, California.

“This fight is very difficult,” Castano told BoxingScene.com. “Teixeira is a great fighter. But when I win this fight, I want to fight with [Jermell] Charlo next. He’s a great fighter, the fights with him pay good and he has three titles. After this, he is my next victim. First, I have to take care of Teixeira. He’s a great fighter. I really respect Teixeira. I’m not underestimating him at all.”

Houston’s Charlo (34-1, 18 KOs) wants the winner of Teixeira-Castano because whoever emerges victorious from their fight would own the only 154-pound title Charlo doesn’t possess. Charlo beat the Dominican Republic’s Jeison Rosario (20-2-1, 14 KOs) by eighth-round knockout in his last fight, September 26 at Mohegan Sun Arena in Uncasville, Connecticut, to add the IBF and WBA belts to his WBC championship.

Charlo-Castano would be easier to make than Charlo-Teixeira because Castano, like Charlo, is affiliated with Al Haymon’s Premier Boxing Champions. Teixeira is represented by Golden Boy Promotions, which typically doesn’t do business with Haymon’s company.

DAZN will stream the battle between Teixeira (31-1, 22 KOs) and Castano (16-0-1, 12 KOs), the mandatory challenger for Teixeira’s title, as part of the Joseph Diaz Jr.-Shavkatdzhon Rakhimov undercard Saturday (8 p.m. EST; 5 p.m. PST). Diaz (31-1, 15 KOs), of Downey, California, will make the first defense of his IBF junior lightweight title against Tajikistan’s Rakhimov (15-0, 12 KOs), Diaz’s mandatory challenger.

Neither Teixeira nor Castano has fought since November 2019.

Teixeira defeated Dominican contender Carlos Adames (18-1, 14 KOs) by unanimous decision in his last fight, a 12-rounder for the WBO interim junior middleweight title at The Cosmopolitan in Las Vegas. Four weeks earlier, Castano stopped Nigeria’s Wale Omotoso (28-5, 22 KOs) after five rounds due to Omotoso’s shoulder injury in a scheduled 10-rounder at MGM National Harbor in Oxon Hill, Maryland.

Teixeira, 30, and Castano, 31, initially were scheduled to fight April 25 at Fantasy Springs. That entire show was canceled due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

Keith Idec is a senior writer/columnist for BoxingScene.com. He can be reached on Twitter @Idecboxing.