With the fight against Floyd Mayweather Jr. slowly slipping away, promoter Bob Arum is looking at pitting Manny Pacquiao against Yuri Foreman, with Foreman’s World Boxing Association light-welterweight title at stake.

As hopes fade to save the Manny Pacquiao-Floyd Mayweather bout, promoter Bob Arum is giving much thought to a substitute fight for the Filipino that at first glance may look unappealing but could still end up momentous.

“In my opinion the (Pacquiao-Mayweather) fight has no chance of happening and we should go and do other things and revisit it later in the year,” Arum told ESPN from his vacation spot in Cabo San Lucas in Mexico.

“That is what I would suggest. That may not be how it works out. I don’t know. It’s a damn shame, but it’s out of my hands. When I think of having to share a dais with those sleazebags, Oscar (De La Hoya) and (Richard) Schaefer, after what they’ve been saying about Manny, it turns my stomach,” said Arum.

Arum is training his sights on a March 20 date at the Thomas and Mack Center in Las Vegas for Pacquiao against Yuri Foreman, the reigning World Boxing Association light-welterweight champion who was born in Belarus but raised in Israel.

What should intrigue the public is the fact that Pacquiao is going for his eighth world title against Foreman, a 29-year-old now based in Brooklyn, New York.

Foreman, incidentally, is also under the Top Rank banner like Pacquiao.

Pacquiao has won titles at flyweight, super-bantam, feather, super-feather, lightweight, light-welter and welter, the first fighter ever to win that number of belts in as many weight classes and the prospects of him shooting for an eighth should tickle just about everyone’s fancy.

The past few days, negotiations have turned from bad to worse after Mayweather insisted that Pacquiao undergo Olympic-style random drug testing to determine if he is indeed as clean as he claims he is.

Stung by Mayweather and even by De La Hoya and Schaefer’s allegations, Pacquiao lashed back at them by filing of a lawsuit for defamation Thursday.

Pacquiao has tapped celebrity and sports lawyer Daniel Petrocelli as counsel in his bid to penalize Mayweather and company for their accusations of drug-use.

Meanwhile, Pacquiao lawyer Franklin Gacal said his boss is leaving it all up to Arum to decide what to do next.

“While Manny wants the Mayweather fight to happen, he will not go to the extent of shaming himself by giving in to his demands for the fight to take place,” said Gacal.