The Olympic Games are such a big event that over the past month they have largely pushed professional boxing off the back pages and the TV screens. The Games are over so it is back to business with a bang. On the weekend of 9/10 September in title fights we have Gennady Golovkin vs. Kell Brook, Carlos Cuadras vs. Ramon Gonzalez , John Riel Casimero vs. Charlie Edwards, Lee Haskins vs. Stuart Hall, Daniel Jacobs vs. Sergio Mora and Robert Easter vs. Richard Commey. On the weekend of 16/17 we have Shinsuke Yamanaka vs. Anselmo Moreno, Hugo Ruiz vs. Hozumi Hasegawa, Krzys Glowacki vs. Olek Usyk and of course Saul Alvarez vs. Liam Smith and those are just the world title fights. There are plenty other top flight fighters in action. Further down the time line we have Sergey Kovalev vs. Andre Ward. Welcome back big time boxing we’ve missed you.
Are the great days finally over for Manny Pacquiao now that HBO have refused to buy the Manny Pacquiao vs. Jesse Vargas fight? Nothing personal, it is a business decision. They have looked at what the fight would cost them and what the potential revenue would be and decided the business case does not add up. Even at 37 “Pac Man” would still be at least 50/50 to beat any welterweight in the world but he is not the solid gold PPV seller he was. Of course it is also about Jesse Vargas who despite an impressive win over Sadam Ali as yet does not have the profile to be a PPV fighter off his own bat so he has to fly on Pacquiao’s coat tails for now. A win would give Pacquiao the WBO title and Tim Bradley would be his mandatory challenger. After three fights which did not set the world alight a fourth Pacquiao vs. Bradley fight would be a hard sell. A loss would spell the end of a truly great career but in either case the times they are a changing. No fighter in the history of boxing has won world titles at both flyweight and welterweight and no other Filipino sportsman has done as much to bring pride and prestige to his nation. If he promises to make the Vargas fight his last one I promise to travel to the Hall of Fame in five years time to see him get the Hall of Fame ring and the fist cast he so richly deserves. Better get myself a piggy bank. Filipino’s have been in the news quite a bit lately. On Saturday in Taguid City Puerto Rican McJoe Arroyo defends his IBF super fly title against Filipino Jerwin Ancajas and I lean towards Ancajas to lift the title. There is talk of another Filipino star Nonito Donaire defending his WBO super bantam title against unbeaten No 1 challenger Jessie Magdaleno. Donaire has a huge edge in experience and Magdaleno has yet to go further than eight rounds in a fight but he has lots of talent and is much the younger man. A great match up of experience vs. youth. No youth involved with Jack Asis who has announced his retirement. Now as much an Australian as a Filipino the 33-year-old former IBO super feather champion showed what good management and a planned career can do. After a run of five losses in a row Asis was an unremarkable 21-18-4 but with that quality management and through building a good “home base” in Australia Asis went 14-0-1 in his next 15 fights before losing his IBF title to Malcolm Klassen last month. He is immensely popular down under. It seems that the WBC can’t make their mind up over Alex Povetkin’s alleged positive test after his fight with Mariusz Wach in November. They have forced Povetkin to fight an eliminator with Bermane Stiverne. If they believed that Povetkin did used a banned substance then they should have given him an extended ban and taken him out of the No 1 spot in their ratings. If they do not believe the alleged positive test then why have they deprived him of the mandated straight shot at Deontay Wilder that he was supposed to have earlier this year before Wilder got injured in the Chris Arreola fight? Either Povetkin was guilty or he was innocent but the WBC decision is at best a compromise or it was a cop out. The fall-out from the Rio Olympic comes in all shapes and sizes. The AIBA received heavy praise from the IOC for their “contribution and dedication” to the “success” of the Olympic boxing tournament. That opinion is one view but others hold the view that some of the judging was just as poor as it always is at the Olympics. In fairness the pro game has little to throw stones about as there are poor decisions every week in professional boxing and quite a bit of home biased scoring. The big difference is the impact on the fighters involved in chasing an Olympic medal. If a pro boxer gets robbed he can hope to get his revenge within weeks or months. A loss at the Olympics means the end of a four year dream and a wait of another four years before there is a chance to right that wrong. There were 273 bouts at the Olympics and relatively few bad decisions. The problem was that some of those bad decisions came in high profile fights and were so obviously wrong. The upside is that the AIBA were severely criticised and forced to take some action. Many thought that Kazak boxer Vasily Levit was robbed of the gold medal when he lost to Russian Evgeny Tischenko. The Kazak government had promised $150, 000 to their athletes for a silver medal but they allocated Levit the additional $100,000 that he would have received had he won the gold. In addition Russian Andrew Ryabinsky said if both Levit and Tischenko would agree to turn pro he would promote a fight between them and it would be a big draw. Whilst even settling for silver would have brought Levit a big reward for Paddy Barnes and Michael Conlan controversial losses saw insult and injury. Both thought they had won clearly but went home without a medal. No medal-no funding. Despite their outstanding performances over the years without elite level funding they could be forced to turn professional. No wonder Conlan exploded with rage. Other post Olympic notes: Kazak gold medal winner Daniyar Yeleussinov is looking to turn his gold medal into an even bigger cash cow. The 25-year-old welterweight is said to be on his way to join his brother Dauren who is based in Brooklyn and fighting under the Lou Di Bella banner. Spanish boxer Youba Sissokho also competed at welterweight in Rio. He put off an operation on a tumour in his neck to compete but luckily it turned out to be benign. You get out what you put in. India failed to win any boxing medals and only three of their boxers qualified. Despite a gold medal at the 2010 Commonwealth Games Manoj Kumar received no funding until he actually qualified for Rio in June which was too late to be of any use to him. Vijender Singh has shown the potential is huge there but with their national federation terminated in 2012 and showing no signs of coalescing into a format acceptable to the AIBA Rio served to emphasise just what a mess amateur boxing is in there. It is not much better for the members of the Pakistan team. Their daily allowance in camp whilst preparing for the Olympic qualifiers worked out at about $1 per day. There is no level playing field. Medals are influenced by funding. Not one sub-Sahara male boxer won a boxing medal and yet on the other side of the coin despite a well-funded elite programme Britain landed only one silver and one bronze and the USA also took only one silver and one bronze. The USA needs to take a long look at how they prepare their boxers. There is often a transformation when their fighters turn pro so you have to ask why fighters such a Rau’shee Warren, Errol Spence, Jose Carlos Ramirez and Terrell Gausha can succeed as pros when they can’t even get though the Olympic quarter-finals? My final thoughts are that the vote of confidence from the IOC has strengthened the AIBA’s hand and effectively endorsed their policy of opening the Olympics to professional boxers. The AIBA’s Rio experiment was a dismal failure as they kicked the whole thing off too late with only a couple of high profile pros taking up the offer. Instead of those pros contributing to the profile of the boxing tournament they crawled away with their tails between their legs. Look for the AIBA to now do some long term planning using the time towards the World Championships to get a lot more pros on board. They will not go away and will only get stronger. Felix Sturm has sold up his businesses and his gym in Germany and moved himself and his family to Bosnia. He is still disputing through the courts his alleged positive test for the illegal substance Hydro-XY Stanozol at the time of his revenge victory over Fedor Chudinov in February which saw him win the WBA super middle title. Due to the court case the WBA still show him as their world champion and Sturm intends to return to action next year so it is a messy position. In the meantime the secondary version of the WBA super middle title is very much in play with Giovanni De Carolis set to give Tyrone Zeuge a return match. De Carolis retained his title with a draw in Germany against Zeuge in July now he will travel to Potsdam to face Zeuge again on 5 November. Still on Germany in Goppingen on 17 September Firat Arslan, a former WBA secondary champion at cruiser, fights Nuri Seferi for the vacant WBO European title. Also on the show Odlanier Solis has his second comeback fight against Serbian-based Croatian Alek Todorovic and Karo Murat faces Czech-based Ukrainian Yevgeni Makhteienko for the vacant WBA International title. Both the Solis and Murat fights are poor matches. Nice to see the WBA making a move towards reducing the number of champions by ordering real champion Kohei Kono to face interim champion Luis Concepcion. The win makes Concepcion the one and only WBA champion in the division. Now let’s see them force unification fights to clear up their 12 secondary champions and 8 more interim champions so they can have just one champion in each of the other 14 divisions. The number is 14 and not 16 as both Ricky Burns and Anthony Crolla are the only WBA champions in their divisions. In my report of last week’s action I did not mention the results from a small show in Auckland, New Zealand where heavyweight Junior Fa moved to five wins with a first round kayo over a fighter having his first pro fight. Not newsworthy. However when IBF/ WBO mandatory challenger Joseph Parker fought in his first New Zealand national championships he lost to Uaine Fa Junior. When Parker entered the Oceania qualifiers for the 2012 Olympics he failed to qualify losing to Uaine Fa Junior so perhaps it would have been smart of me to at least mention him. The reservations I have about the 26-year-old Fa is that he is up at 273lbs (124kgs) so not sure about his mobility. If you were looking for someone to play the part of Dr Frankenstein’s monster then former WBA heavyweight champion Nikolay Valuev might seem a good choice. The 7’0” (213cm) tall Russian with his hard chiselled features would tick most of the boxes. However what you see with Nikolay is not what you get. Surprisingly he has turned out to be a successful politician but even stranger he has been chosen to front a new popular children’s programme on Russian TV entitled “Good night kids”. Nikolay has three kids of his own and has some excellent ideas for the programme to have a positive influence. He will share the limelight with some puppets of long standing including a pig, a bunny rabbit, a calf and a puppy. Has to be better than sharing a ring with Ruslan Chagaev, John Ruiz, Evander Holyfield and David Haye. Stuff to look out for. Former IBO cruiser champion Rakhim Chakhkiev has his second fight of the year in Moscow on 9 September where he tackles Argentinian Alejandro Valori. This is on the undercard to Eduard Troyanovski’s IBF super light title defence against Keita Obara from Japan. Robert Helenius starts yet another rebuilding programme as he tries to rebound from his loss to Johann Duhaupas with a victory against the way over the hill Konstantin Airich in Mariehamn, Finland on 10 September. German light heavy Domenic Boesel (22-0) puts his WBO No 1 rating on the line against Frenchman Tony Averlant (24-8-2). That won’t be an easy one for Boesel as Averlant, the WBFederation champion, has won his last 6 fights. Boesel vs. Sergey Kovalev or Andre Ward-forget it. October 14 in Hamburg WBO No 2 cruiser Noel Gevor (21-0) puts his WBO International title up for grabs against useful Italian Mario Larghetti (24-2).
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Last weekend was yet another outstanding weekend for UK boxing. Obviously the highlight was Carl Frampton’s victory over Leo Santa Cruz. It rates right up there with the best ever efforts by fighters from the UK fighting overseas. It may not have been in the other guy’s backyard but it was against a 27-year-old fighter with a 32-0-1 record with 31 wins in a row, a three-division champion, and a fighter with an 11-0 score in world title contests. I have to be honest and say I thought it might be just a step too far for Frampton but he proved me wrong. What I admired is the way he won. Whether on the back foot using his boxing skills or standing toe-to-toe in the trenches he was brilliant. I am particularly pleased for Barry McGuigan whose faith in Frampton’s potential to make history has never wavered but above all for Shane McGuigan who has had his credentials as a trainer questioned by some-questions answered. Back in England we saw Luke Campbell and Josh Warrington strengthen their chances of world title shots. UK fighters now hold 14 versions of world titles a total we never dreamed about before and yet we may not have peaked. I started to do a list of other potential champions established fighters such as David Haye, George Groves, Amir Khan, Chris Eubank Jr., Callum Smith and also those still coming through Jack Catterall, Liam Walsh, Gavin McDonnell, Liam Williams, Ryan Burnett etc. and found 20 fighters who could win titles. If this keeps up we may not have any losers we like to love.
What a mess the heavyweight division is in. Just a few months ago it looked as though had been revived as the division to watch but recently it is falling apart. Tyson Fury is fighting allegations of the use of a banned substance, Deontay Wilder is not going to be able to fight again this year as he recovers from separate surgeries to repair the torn right biceps and broken right hand he suffered in his fight with Chris Arreola and the WBA eliminators to find a single heavyweight champion (believe that if you like-or are stupid) is falling apart on them. They have stripped Ruslan Chagaev for not complying with their order to fight a return match with Fres Oquendo and Chagaev has retired citing problems with his left eye that will require surgery. They have called for purse offers for the fight between interim champion Luis Ortiz and Alexander Ustinov by 15 August. That fight was being talked about as a support to the Saul Alvarez vs. Liam Smith fight but will be put back if it happens at all. Russian promoter Vlad Hyrunov was saying last week that the fight might not happen. I am not going to cry if it does not go ahead as it’s a drugs cheat against a fighter who is big and slow and has somehow gone from being unrated at the start of 2015 to No 3 in the wonderful WBA ratings. He fought his way to this lofty position in 2015 by beating Travis Walker who had lost his last 7 fights (actually Ustinov suddenly appeared at No 7 in the WBA ratings before he even fought Walker), 40-year-old Maurice Harris who in his fight before facing Ustinov had fought a draw with Grover Young who had a 12-16-1 record (no promotion for Ustinov for this momentous feat) and in December last year he beat Konstantin Airich to go to No 5. Now without fighting for 7 months he is No 3. Blatant manipulation! Oquendo’s rating is even sillier but the WBA are in a bind since he won a court case arising from his loss to Chagaev in July 2014 so he is WBA No 4 despite not having fought for over two years. Put Anthony Joshua in cotton wool-he is the last man standing. I am glad that the Miguel Cotto vs. Juan Manuel Marquez fight has fallen through. The two parties were nearly there on money but could not agree on the weight at which it would take place with Cotto wanting 150lbs and Marquez 147lbs. Cotto will look at options now that his knee injury has healed and I can understand that he does not want his 15 year career to end on the loss to Saul Alvarez but Marquez will be 43 this month and has nothing to prove. It will be interesting to see whether the respective parties in the WBO ordered title fight between light champion Terry Flanagan and mandatory challenger Felix Verdejo can come to an agreement over terms by the 21 August deadline set by the WBO. If not then it goes to purse offers with the minimum purse set at $150,000. Top Rank have sent Jose Zepeda and Diego Magdaleno over to Britain to face Flanagan and they both lost so they will want that streak broken and getting Verdejo home advantage could be a big factor in that. In theory Roy Jones should have nothing to prove but still he goes on proving he is an idiot. On 13 August in Pensacola he fights “Rocking” Rodney Moore a 40-year-old who has lost his last 9 fights. I could understand Jones hanging around for a meaningful fight but this is rubbish which just tarnishes the legacy of a once great boxer. Donnie Nietes has said he will relinquish his WBO light fly title and move up to flyweight. He is scheduled to fight former WBC flyweight champion Edgar Sosa in Carson on 24 September with the intention being to challenge Juan Francisco Estrada for the WBA/WBO fly titles next year. That may just be a bridge too far for the Filipino great. With the possibility that Ramon Gonzalez might relinquish his WBC fly title if he beats Carlos Cuadras for the WBC super fly title there is talk of trying to get Pakistani boxer Muhammad Waseem a title shot. That really would be ridiculous. He was one of the best amateur ever produced by Pakistan and had plenty of success but never managed to win a gold medal at the Commonwealth, World or Olympic tournaments. As a pro he has had four fights. Last month he won the vacant WBC Silver title by beating Jether Oliva and that will probably get him a top ten rating even though neither he or Oliva were rated in the WBC top 40 prior to the fight. That just goes to show how these spurious titles skew ratings making a nonsense of them. Waseem was a top amateur but he is not Vasyl Lomachenko or Zhou Shiming. Amateur achievements are no guarantee of professional success and an indifferent amateur record does not mean the fighter will not shine as a pro. On 4 September in Zama, Japan, Naoya Inoue will defend his WBO super fly title against Thai Karoon Jarupianlerd (Petchbarngborn to me). The Japanese “Monster” is generally recognised as one of the best small fighters in the world but as an amateur he failed to win a medal at either the World Youth Games or the World Championships so there are no guarantees. There is one fighter who is anxious to fight Guillermo Rigondeaux and that is his WBA mandatory challenger Moises “Chucky” Flores who holds the IBO belt. He won the IBO belt and the interim WBA title with a unanimous decision over Namibian Paulus Ambunda in Windhoek in June and is 25-0. The challenger’s team claims that negotiations are ongoing over the fight with Rigondeaux. Good match this weekend will see Aussie-based Filipino Jack Asis defend his IBO super feather title against Malcolm Klassen in South Africa. The fight was delayed as Asis’s team insisted on neutral officials. A wise precaution but an even wiser one is to make sure he gets paid as there are still fighters who have not received a single Rand from their fights last year. Tevin Farmer’s win over Ivan Redkach last weekend drew remarks on how he had turned his career around. Farmer was 7-4-1 in his first 12 fights but has won 15 in a row since then. Jack Asis has also done a good turnaround. When he lost to Ryan Langham in 2011 he had gone 0-5-1 in his last 6 fights and was 21-18-4 in his career to that point. Since then Asis is 14-0-1in 15 fights. My Favourite is Mexican Quirino Garcia. He lost his first 18 fights and then went 32-3-1 in his next 36. Usually these things are down to a new manager or promoter who is willing to invest in the fight so that he does not have to take last minute jobs on the road, together with a new trainer and perhaps a new environment. One of the benefits that pro boxing gets from the amateurs is the high class fighters who don’t make to the Olympics and decided not to wait another four years but go into the paid ranks. The latest French star to move over is Adriani Vastine who will have his first pro fight on 30 September in Monaco. He was French national champion in 2005, 2006 and 2008 at 64gk, champion in 2009 and 2011 at 69kg and in 2013 at 75kg and was a bronze medallist at the European championships. He is the elder brother of Alexis an Olympic bronze medal winner who died in a helicopter crash in March 2015 whilst filming for a French reality show. Adriani is 32 so may have moved over too late. The Olympics are just about to kick-off as I write. All of the focus is on what the AIBA is doing in Rio but I warn again this is just the start of an invasion of professional boxing by the AIBA and its affiliates. The European Boxing Confederation makes no bones about it. On their web site they state quite clearly “The mission of the EUBC is to govern the sport of boxing in all its forms in Europe under the control and direction of the AIBA. You have been warned! On the other hand I noted that there was to be a WBC Australian Amateur Championships Tournament in Australia on 11-13 August. The Boxing Board of Australia, the body that governs amateur boxing in Australia, has made it clear that they have not sanctioned this tournament and any boxers, coaches or officials who participate will face disciplinary action. I have been unable to get any comment on this from my contacts at the WBC or ANBF. Canadian boxer Kevin Bizier has announced his retirement. He stated that he had hidden an injury to his left eye before his fight with Kell Brook in March and had surgery last week on the eye. Kevin, 31, was Canadian amateur champion in 2004, 2005, 2007 and 2008 and competed at the World Championships and the Commonwealth Games but turned pro after failing to qualify for the 2008 Olympics. He had ended up with a 25-3 record losing twice on split decisions to Ionut Dan Ion and was stopped in five rounds by Brook for the IBF title. It looks as though the career of former South African and WBU champion Phillip Ndou could be over. Ndou, 39, had been hoping to appear on a show in South Africa last week. However on the advice of two physicians the Boxing South Africa (BSA) revoked his licence. Ndou turned up at the weigh-in for a show and allegedly attacked BSA officials blaming them for ruining his career. He appeared in court and was released on bail with the hearing set for 15 September. Even when the legal proceedings are over he will almost certainly face action by BSA. He had collapsed after a fight in 2004 and was than inactive for almost five years. He was 32-1 in his first 33 fights but then lost to Floyd Mayweather Jr. for the WBC light title in 2003. After returning to the ring in 2009 he lost to Lovemore Ndou for the vacant IBO welter title. Ndou allegedly used a knobkerrie to attack the officials, that is a type of club with a large knob at one end. Those BSA guys are lucky Olek Usyk said he would be taking along a Kalashnikov for his fight with Krzys Glowacki for the WBO cruiser title in Poland on 17 September. Only joking –I hope. On better news from Africa Joseph Agbeko is scheduled to return to the ring on 27 August in Accra against Tanzanian Hajji Juma. It will be “King Kong’s” first fight for almost 15 months but as Hajji normally fights at flyweight this should not be a problem for the former IBF and IBO bantamweight champion. One day before, also in Accra, Isaac Dogboe faces Neil John Tabano for the vacant WBC Youth title. Dogboe, 21, is 14-0. Filipino Tabano, 22, looks a good test as he is 13-1 and his only loss was on a split decision against useful Randy Braga for the Philippines title last year. German hope Tyron Zeuge has been promised that Sauerland Promotions will do all they can to get him a return match with Giovanni De Carolis. The young German fought a draw with De Carolis last month allowing the Italian to retain his secondary WBA and GBU super middle titles. Zeuge suffered an injury to his left arm in the sixth round of the fight and his trainer Juergen Braehmer is confident Zeuge can win next time. Two other Sauerland fighters have fights arranged. Cruiser Noel Gevor (21-0) puts his WBO International title on the line against tough Italian Mario Larghetti (24-2) in Hamburg on 14 October. This will be the first real test for Gevor, the step-son of former IBF, WBA and WBO title challenger Khoren Gevor. Larghetti’s two losses have come on points against Marco Huck for the WBO title and unbeaten Micki Nielsen. Boxing is very much a family business but it is not always the case that children of boxers become boxers. Judging at ringside for the Tony Harrison vs. Sergey Rabchenko and Paul Malignaggi vs. Gabriel Bracero fights were Carlos Ortiz Jr. and Julie Lederman. Julie also worked the Mickey Garcia vs. Elio Rojas. She is the daughter of Hall of Fame’s Harold who judged his first fight back in 1967 and is one of my oldest friends in boxing. Perhaps I should rephrase that to a friend of very long standing. Sometime they do follow dad’s footsteps (or mum’s these days). In Santa Rosa, Venezuela Ernesto Espana Jr retained the national super light title with a sixth round stoppage of Ciro Moreno. The 35-year-old Espana is the son of Ernesto Snr who was WBA light champion back in 1979/80. Espana Jr. is 19-0 and this was the third defence of his title. I was as surprised as anyone over the announcement of the Gennady Golovkin vs. Kell Brook fight and my initial reaction was that it was not the right fight for Brook in the same way the Amir Khan vs. Saul Alvarez struck me. I admire the courage and confidence in Brook that has seen him take a fight that fear, or in the case of Chris Eubank Snr and Jr. stupid arrogance, has led to others turning it down. For Khan I felt that Alvarez would be too big, too strong and too hard a puncher for Khan to have any chance of winning. Khan fought a brilliant tactical fight for five rounds but in the end all of my fears were borne out. I have heard people say that this will not be the same as the Alvarez vs. Khan fight. I accept that no two fights are identical and that Brook is a big welter going up to middle whereas Khan was more of a big lightweight going up to middle but the difference are not all pluses. As I understand it there will be no false weight limits so Golovkin will not have to come down to 155 or 156lbs he will be a full middleweight. The biggest difference is the contrasting styles of Alvarez and Golovkin. Alvarez is not quick. He is a grinder a one-paced-get to you eventually tank. Golovkin has real foot and hand speed and is a ferocious hunter. He does not give the other fighter the chance to apply his own tactics. He is in his face from the first bell and can take opponents out with one punch from either hand. He will have height and reach in his favour and although Brook has the makings of a great welterweight champion the step-up from Shawn Porter, Ionut Dan Ion, Frankie Gavin and Kevin Bizier to Golovkin is for me a step too far. I am British and hope Brook comes out on top but I am also Scottish so whatever the odds my money will stay in my sporran.
The focus on the rights or wrongs of Golovkin vs. Brook have overshadowed an even more questionable match with Charlie Edwards being allowed to challenge John Riel Casimero for the IBF flyweight title. Edwards was an outstanding amateur and is a great prospect but there is nothing in his seven wins to merit a rating let alone a shot at the title. Let’s face it Louis Norman, Phil Smith and Luke Wilton, his last three opponents, are good learning fights for a young prospect just starting out in the pro ranks but that is all. In his last fight in February he won the WBC International Silver title and the WBC have awarded him the No 36 spot in their ratings. The IBF were not impressed with that win until they got the sniff of a sanctioning fee. They did not put Edwards in their March, April or May ratings but in their June ratings, published 5 July, Edwards suddenly appears at No 14 not having fought for five months. Blatant manipulation and whether it benefits a British fighter or not it is just basically dishonest. As for Casimero he is not a Golovkin, but then who is. He is a small flyweight but is a very tough fighter and he won’t be intimidated by a hostile crowd. When he beat Luis Lazarte for the interim IBF light fly title in 2012 the atmosphere was so hostile Lazarte actually mentioned to Casimero during the fight that he might not get out alive if he won and indeed there was a serious riot when he was declared the winner. Another case of focusing on the wrong ball is the fuss over the AIBA allowing professionals to fight at the Olympics. Yes it is a significant indication of their intent but at this stage small scale and largely ignored by professional fighters. The real uncovering of the AIBA’s intent to become yet another sanctioning body will come when they stage the World Championships. They will have plenty of time to plan out what they want to do and also have total control of the Championships. They don’t have to pay lip service to the Olympic Committee they can make the World Championships a fully profession tournament and no one can stop them from doing so-except the affiliated national associations-and they have already approved professionals in the Olympics so are on the slippery slope of putting themselves out of business. What government is going to grant money to maintain an elite squad to compete against professionals? There are already signs of the impact of the policy of allowing professionals in the Olympics. Kenya failed to get any fighters through the earlier qualifiers but wanted financing to send fighters to the last chance qualifiers in Venezuelan. In simple terms they were told that if their boxers could not get through the earlier qualifiers there was no chance they would do so with professionals added to the mix so no money was forthcoming. Any government which funds sports is investing in the hope of some good results which would reflect favourably on their country but they are not going to want to throw money away if there is no hope of a return. I was not surprised to see the AIBA and the WBA putting their heads together. Good luck to them, they deserve each other. Any cooperation will only go so far as both Dr Wu and Gilberto Mendoza are much too attached to their powerful positions to share any of that power. The final communiqué talked about “Both AIBA and WBA have agreed to envisage future partnerships covering all aspects of boxing from event organisation, boxer management and new championships, to training courses.” And I picked up on the words “new championships” and I saw more titles, more sanction fees, more confusion etc. Our sport is changing constantly but not always for the better. I am not sure I am happy to see Manny Pacquiao coming back. I feel he had done everything he needed to do and beating Danny Garcia or Jessie Vargas will neither hurt nor enhance his reputation and the thought of a possible return match with Mayweather turns me off. He is still big money so why not return and make even more money. I did find his dismissal of there being any impact on his Senate work amusing. If he can fit-in an exhausting and intensive training schedule-and it takes more time the older you get- and everything else involved in a return to the ring without it impacting on his senate work it might just make some Filipino’s question just how work politicians do for there money. Pacquiao vs. Brook now that would have been a much better fight. Pity it was not on the table. It appears Sergey Kovalev was suffering from laryngitis when he went into training for his fight with Isaac Chilemba which might explain his uninspiring performance. Credit to Chilemba-he never made it easy for Kovalev, but the “Krusher” seemed to be lacking a degree of aggression and will have to have a better night when he fights Andre Ward. A very generous Kovalev said he was going to donate his purse from the Chilemba fight to the family of Roman Simakov. Kovalev halted Simakov in seven rounds in December 2011 in a fight for the WBC Asian Boxing Council title. Simakov was hospitalised after the fight and in a coma and died a few days later without coming out of the coma. The EBU may be nearing break point with the German DBD over Erkan Teper. When Teper won the European title he, his management and the DBD signed an agreement to abide by the EBU rules which called for testing by WADA and a two year suspension for a positive test. Teper reportedly gave a positive test when beating David Price and was put on the EBU suspensions list showing him suspended until 17 July 2017. He is contesting his positive test with the DBD and had a fight this month claiming that his suspension only affects him if he wants to fight for the EBU title. The EBU has downgraded the DBD to a “provisional member” and the DBD no longer has anyone on the Board of the EBU. If a full break does happen it will be a huge blow to the DBD. There will be other organisations in Germany looking to take their place but there is a question as to whether they are any better than the DBD so it is an unclear picture and again shows how difficult it is for our sport to police drug cheats. The WBC has been doing some good work in Ghana. They recently adopted a farming community in the Volta Region of Ghana and will work with a non-government organisation focusing on health, education, sports and sanitation putting the WBC’s world reach to good use. In addition they also made a grant of $4,800 to former champion David “Poison” Kotey who has fallen on hard times. It took me a long time to forgive Kotey for beating my hero Ruben Olivares for the WBC feather title in 1975. He lost his title to Danny Lopez in 1976 in his third defence and was also an undefeated Commonwealth champion. The WBC simultaneously made a grant of $3,600 to former WBC International and Commonwealth champion Ebo Danquah. The presentation of the grants was made by the head of the Ghana Board Peter Zwennes who had worked hard to get the grants made. Two excellent gestures by the WBC. Less happy for boxing in Ghana was the arrest of Braimah Kamoko. He allegedly attacked a man with the flat plane of a machete but at the time of writing no charge sheet had formally been drawn up. Just a few years back it looked as though the WBO was going to make Kamoko the mandatory challenger to Nathan Cleverly but that faded away as there are serious questions over Kamoko’s eyesight. The 36-year-old “Bukom Bantu” is unbeaten in 29 fights but has never fought outside Ghana. Still on Africa Malcolm Klassen, who has had two reigns as IBF super feather champion, is looking to add another world title as he challenges Australian/Filipino Jack Asis for the IBO title in Johannesburg on 29 July. The 34-year-old Klassen has scored recent victories over Justin Savi, Paulus Moses and Leonilo Miranda but the 33-year-old Asis, making the first defence of his IBO title is 14-0-1in his last 15 fights so a real 50/50 one here. Also a nice show taking place in Kempton Park, South Africa on 24 July which will see Shaun Ness defending his national title against his BSA No 3 rated challenger Ntuthuko Memela with light flyweight prospect Deejay Kriel facing Ayanda Dulani to try to cancel out the draw when they fought each other in April. It was a very mixed week for former IBF super middle champion Graciano Rocchigiani. He put on a small hall show in Mitte, Germany that was well received but was also charged with allegedly extorting Euro 5,000 from a promoter. Trouble is nothing new for either of the Rocchigiani brothers. Manuel Charr will continue his comeback with a fight in Toronto on 10 September. The former WBC heavyweight title challenger was wounded in shooting in September last year but recovered and returned with a win in June. His opponent will be Toronto-based Ukrainian Olek Teslenko. The 23-year-old, 6’4” Teslenko, a runner-up in the Ukrainian amateur championships, has five wins but they have all been over quickly so he has had less than ten rounds of boxing and he will be giving away weight to Charr. Fights coming up. This Sunday in yet another bit of madness Pakistani boxer Muhammad Waseem faces Filipino Jeter Olivo for the vacant WBC Silver flyweight title. Waseem has had only three fights and neither fighter is in the WBC top 40 but the winner could find himself rated in their top 10 due to the importance the WBC place on their Silver titles. That’s makes no sense except nonsense. Under the Terrence Crawford vs. Viktor Postol unification match on 23 July Oscar Valdez and Matias Rueda clash for the vacant WBO feather title with Jose Benavidez facing Francisco Santana and Olek Gvozdyk meeting Tommy Karpency. On 13 August Edis Tatli defends his EBU title against Spanish champion Cristian Morales. September 9 in Moscow Eduard Troyanovsky defends his IBF super light title against Keita Obara. September 10 Los Angeles Roman Gonzalez goes for a fourth division title as he challenges Carlos Cuadras for the WBC super fly title in a real clash of styles and perhaps the biggest test so far for the Nicaraguan wonder. September 16 in Osaka Shinsuke Yamanaka makes the tenth defence of his WBC bantam title against Anselmo Moreno who he beat on a split verdict last September and Hozumi Hasegawa challenges Hugo Ruiz for the WBC super bantam title. If 35-year-old Hasegawa wins he will be the eldest Japanese fighter to win a world title. September 24 will see WBO light fly champion Donnie Nietes in his biggest fight as he challenges Mexican Juan Francisco Estrada for the WBA and WBO flyweight titles. Nietes is unbeaten in his last 30 fights and has yet to taste defeat in 15 title fights over two divisions but the big career defining fights have passed him by so he needs this win. I wish I could sit down and just write about the great weekend for British boxing and the outstanding achievements of Ricky Burns winning a title in a third division and Tony Bellew winning a world title at the third attempt. Perhaps even about Saul Alvarez and Gennady Golovkin, or whether Tyson Fury beat Wlad Klitschko because of great talent or because Klitschko had an off night to end all off nights and who will win the return, or how good it is to see matches such as Kell Brook vs. Jesses Vargas coming together so quickly. It would also be nice to be reporting that Floyd Mayweather Jr. had done himself some minor damage in tripping over his brain cell and talk of Conor McGregor and another Manny Pacquiao fight has disappeared in smoke- and so much more.
However two subjects, the AIBI voting to allow professionals to box at the Olympics and the controversy surrounding high profile fighters testing positive for banned substances are subjects with no positives and it is they that have been making the headlines. With regard to professionals boxing at the Olympics firstly let’s get the hypocrisy out of the way. Almost every other major Olympic sport now has professional athletes competing so talking about the “spirit of the Olympic Games” is nostalgia practised by those with their head in the sand. The Olympics are for both amateur and professional athletes, they will continue that way and only get more commercialised. Every nation that can afford it has an elite athletes programme. If your definition of a “professional” is some who is paid to compete in their sport either in the form of financial grants or prize money or any other direct financial support then the boxers from the countries with elite programmes are professionals as are those competing in the WSB or the AIBA’s own professional boxing. The possibility of horrendous mismatches is naturally a real one but again let’s not kid ourselves that this does not happen to a varying degree every week in professional boxing. My concern is the impact this AIBA decision will have on the nations who cannot afford elite programmes and therefore still have true amateur boxers. In some countries the training facilities and equipment available are less than Spartan and those countries have been able to send very few boxers to the qualification tournaments for Rio. With the advent of professional competitors in the mix the chance of anyone from those poorer countries competing at the Games will be greatly reduced or disappear altogether. The dream of competing at the Olympics and perhaps even getting a medal is what brings many youngsters into amateur boxing and keeps them there. The AIBA have effectively killed that dream and dealt a huge blow to “amateur” boxing. I have see that Amir Khan has indicated he wants to go to Rio and represent Pakistan and Denis Lebedev wants to represent Russia but what if there is already a boxer from those nations who have qualified? This is one of the many unanswered questions arising from the AIBA decision. In many countries the amateur and professional bodies are separate organisations so who selects the fighters for the Olympic qualifiers/Games. Will all professionals have to go through the qualifiers or will some elite professionals get automatic entry to the Games? Will there be a quota system to decide how many professionals will compete at the Games? What happens where a boxer is under an exclusive contract to a promoter or a TV cable outlet with the Olympics coverage being allocated to a rival company? Who insures these fighters? They will not be members of their home amateur Association? And you can be sure that if they decided to fight at the Olympics their home professional Commission or Board will make it clear that they are not covered by their insurance. Just imagine the financial claims if a million dollar fight gets a debilitating injury at the Olympics. Will the professionals get paid for fighting at the Olympics and if so by whom and how much? So many questions. Don’t be surprised that the vote by the AIBA was so heavily in favour. Voting against the President’s wishes has consequences so the safe thing to do, irrespective of your real opinion, is to go with the flow so that the largess from Dr Ching-Kuo Wu keeps on coming in the way of nice appointments etc. But the vote had to go that way because if it had not Dr Wu would have had to resign and it is a case of better the generous President you know….. Another question with the regard to this is that the IOC demands certain standards and frequency of drug testing particularly with regard to out of competition testing so that requirement will be swept under the rug for Rio but then the AIBA have fallen down on this themselves as the WADA reported. Don’t lose sight of the fact that Dr Wu has indicated in the past that he wants the AIBA to move into professional boxing and that the next big event will be the World Championships where the AIBA will have a free hand. Talk of the AIBA and drugs testing (or lack of it in their case) leads me into the drug testing. First let me say that it is a problem that boxing as a whole will never get under control. There is no consistency at any level of the sport as to what is required and when. Different countries, different States, different sanctioning bodies etc. all have their own rules, regulations and penalties. Very few of them work together in any meaningful way. There is no umbrella outfit tying any of this together. Victor Conte described boxing as “the Wild West” of sports where illegal substance use was rife but there was no real law and order. Through his company BALCO Conte supplied banned substance to many top athletes such as Tim Montgomery, Marion Jones, Dwain Chambers and allegedly to Shane Mosley and went to jail for those activities so he should know. Mosley started a multi-million dollar damages suit against Conte but later dropped it. Almost every boxer who has given a positive test has denied taking any banned substance. Deny, deny, deny. It’s the Lance Armstrong un-truth serum method. Even when the fighter concerned has agreed to a specific protocol and testing authority a positive test is still denied. Because of the lack of one over-reaching body the results can be challenged but once the A and B samples have been opened and tested there is no longer a trail of evidence and by the time the results are known it is useless to do any other test as the boxer is probably in another country. Another reason for challenging a positive result is that you cannot always rely on the integrity of the country where the tests are carried out. We had the DBD in Germany covering up a positive test for Erkan Teper and at this time Russian athletes may not be allowed to compete in Rio because of nationally endorsed suppression of positive tests. You have the confusion of the WBC brushing aside alleged positive tests for Mariusz Wach and Olanrewaju Durodola when they could not possibly have done any retesting, letting Francisco Vargas, who tested positive for a steroid, defend his title but refusing to let Alex Povetkin challenge Deontay Wilder even though both tests were carried out by the VADA. You have the IBF brushing aside a positive test for Lamont Peterson and Antonio Tarver twice testing positive but only getting a slap on the wrist each time. The sport does not have harsh penalties for cheats apart from Tarver we saw Luis Ortiz testing positive for steroids after beating Lateef Kayode for the WBA interim title in September 2014 and being “punished” by being allowed to fight for the same title just 13 months later. The two main deterrents to any cheating are the danger of being caught and the possibility of a heavy punishment when caught. Boxing fails on both counts. The focus of testing is on high profile fights and generally shortly before and after the fight. That means that 99% of boxers will probably never be tested and that a boxer can use a banned substance in training which will allow him to trainer harder and longer and provided he stops in time for any trace of the substance to have disappeared from his system he will not be caught. As for punishment as the Luis Ortiz example show it is derisory. Back in 2012/2013 Ortiz had an eight month gap between two fights. After testing positive against Kayode he had a fight just nine months later. The very least that is required is that for every big fight the local body or the sanctioning body or even the promoter must prepare and having in place a drug testing protocol which has to be endorsed and approved by the fighters involved and their management with a commitment to abide by and accept the results-and employ Victor Conte to police it. Poachers make the best Gamekeepers-only joking! It was great to see the triumphs for both Burns and Bellew. On paper Bellew had the hardest task in Illunga Makabu but Burns was attempting to win a title in a third different division and this after a spell of indifferent form. He was back to his best and boxed beautifully. Bellew was in with a guy with a ridiculously high KO% who had beaten some good opposition but Bellew just blew him away. It just keeps getting better and better for British boxing. They say that we are still evolving as a species. If that is so you will soon be able to recognise a boxing fan. On the Darwinian principles he will be the guy who looks like he has grown a third leg or is over-generously endowed but it will only be his enormously enlarged bladder developed to help him sit through shows such as the 98 scheduled rounds in Liverpool. On almost every show I watched on video at the weekend in at least one fight the action had to be stopped so taping could be fixed on a boxer’s glove. In one fight it had to be done three times. Come on guys this is not brain surgery? Unusually these days but in the European title fight between Mahdi Amar and Serhiy Demchenko one judge scored a round 10-8 when there was not a knockdown and one scored a round 10-9 when the referee ruled what looked a slip as a knockdown. Both judges called it as they saw instead of sticking with the knockdown=10-8 guidelines. There is still some common sense out there. One of my pet hates is the No Contest ruling. What does no contest mean? If one fighter is streets ahead of another and wins by the proverbial mile it might be described as no contest. However in the case of an early finish due to a cut up comes No Contest! How can it be No Contest? Does that mean no contest took place? No what it means is that no decision was rendered. Neither fighter won, neither fighter lost and it was not a technical draw. It was a NO DECISION!! Because no decision was rendered. Soap box now nudged aside. Former undefeated WBA light champion Richard Abril is poised to return to the ring. The Cuban has not fought since retaining his title with a win over Edis Tatli in 2014. After that he had a life and death struggle against dengue fever but has won his battle. The undercard for the WBC/WBO unification fight for the super light titles between Terrence Crawford and Viktor Postol in Las Vegas on 23 July has a distinctly Mexican flavour to it. There will be Gilberto Ramirez defending his WBO super middle title against German Dominic Britsch, Oscar Valdez against Argentinian Matias Rueda for the interim WBO feather title, Jose Benavidez facing Francisco Santana at welter and also two interesting fights between Ik Yang and Lenny Zappavigna and Olympic gold medallist Ryota Murata against George Tahdooahnippah. Boxing South Africa (BSA) has a new Chief Executive-good luck to him. If he sees out his tenure without being sacked or forced to resign he will be the first. He has said he wants to clean out the “bad apples”. I wonder if anyone has told him the first one he should get rid of his boss the Sports Minister Fikile Mbalua. At a time when both domestic and Filipino visiting fighters were being defrauded of their purse money by South African promoters he decided that it was in the best interests of South African boxing for him to attend the Floyd Mayweather vs. Manny Pacquiao fight. They could have paid all of the boxers and had money left over for the cost of that trip. The non-payment to South African boxers who competed in a high profile Premier Boxing League last year has been brushed under the carpet with none of the boxers getting paid and more recently IBO welter champion Tsiko Mulovhedzi has complained about being short-changed on his purse for his title defence in April against Jesus Gurrola. Back in 2013 BSA said it would no longer exercise any flexibility with regard to promoters depositing purse money with them prior to fights but it has happened again on two shows in April this year. It can’t help but feel that if it was a white promoter screwing black boxers some strong action would have been taken by now. Not all of Saul Alvarez’s opponents are throwing punches. Right now he is being sued by his former representative Felix Zabala who is claiming $29 million from the contract he had with Alvarez before “Canelo” signed with Golden Boy. Better fight Gennady Golovkin soon Saul-you might need the money Jose “Olivaritos” Morales, the father of Erik, Diego and Ivan was rushed to hospital last week after suffering a stroke. Diego confirmer that his father was making some progress. Some time back Top Rank announced that it was helping promote a tournament in China looking to help the sport develop there at grass roots level. The tournament has progressed to the finals stage with the WBO aiming to crown the winner in each division Greater China champion. It is going to be a long term commitment but to paraphrase someone I would not normally quote-a journey of a million miles starts with just a single step. Two title fights coming up in Thailand later this month with Pungluang (52-3) defending his WBO bantam title against Filipino Marlon Tapales (28-2) on 17 June and Nicaraguan Byron Rojas (17-2-3) defending his WBA minimum title against Knockout CP Freshmart (12-0). Snips and Snipes 19 May 2016
It still looks as though we will get a Saul Alvarez vs. Gennady Golovkin fight but we don’t know where or when. It brings back memories of Floyd Mayweather vs. Manny Pacquiao which seemed so close and then disappeared not to return until it was too late for it to deliver the quality fight we had hoped for earlier. Saul Alvarez has stated clearly that he wants to fight Golovkin. He has relinquished his WBC title to avoid the match going to purse offers. The WBC had given the parties a deadline to complete negotiations or the fight would go to purse offers with the champion Alvarez getting 55% and challenger Golovkin (he was only WBC Interim champion) getting 45%. Neither party wanted those terms to be dictated to them so Alvarez relinquished the title. Now we have to wait and hope a deal can be done. At the time when the Mayweather vs. Pacquiao fight was close to being signed it was every bit as big as this fight but it still did not happen so let’s keep our fingers crossed. What a mess our sport is in over banned substances. The lack of an overreaching world body means that every sanctioning body has its own approach and own standards. We have had a German body covering up for failed tests, we have had the IBF ignoring a positive test from Lamont Peterson, we have had leading heavyweights Lucas Browne and Alex Povetkin testing positive, we have had WBA super super middle champion Felix Sturm testing positive we have a WBA secondary heavyweight champion Luis Ortiz who has twice tested positive, we have had both Francisco Vargas and his challenger Orlando Salido (10 years ago) give positive tests with Vargas somehow being allowed to keep his title, we have had the WBC refusing to accept positive tests for Mariusz Wach and Olanrewaju Durodola and it just goes on and on. These are all very high profile fighters and no one has any idea how many fighters in non-title or main event or preliminary fights are cheating. Almost all of the testing is carried out shortly before or shortly after a fight but a fighter can take a banned substance for weeks to enable him to train longer and harder and then stop taking the substance a couple of weeks before the fight or at whatever time interval is recommended for the all traces of the substance to disappear from the system. I would hazard a guess that less than 1% of active boxers are tested during any year and there is no big fund sitting around to pay for the testing regime that would be needed for us to believe our sport is “clean” We are not alone even the powerful International Association of Athletics (IAAF) is struggling to tackle the problem and international tennis is now beginning to realise it has a problem. It is a problem without a practical solution and as long as the rewards are high and the risks are low it will continue to be a problem for boxing. It is not surprising there has been a storm raging around Tyson Fury. He has publicly made homophobic, sexist and anti-Semitic remarks which have upset a great many people. He has issued apologies but you can’t put the genie back in the bottle. Once you have made hurtful and insulting remarks an apology cures nothing. For some of the groups he has insulted their long battle their freedom from persecution and stigma can still seem fragile so their strong reaction to Fury is understandable. He needs someone advising him that even if these really are his views then he would be smart to keep them to himself because he not only hurts those who are offended but he also hurt his own image and being practical it can greatly damage him financially. If on the other hand he doesn’t really hold to the views he has been spouting than he is an even bigger idiot for self harming. Away from the cameras Fury is a genuinely nice person but he needs to realise that some of those who want to interview him are not interested a “nice” Fury but looking to draw out some unguarded inflammatory remark. I remember back in the old days that Terry Lawless paid as much attention to schooling his fighters over what they said and did outside of the ring as they did inside and Fury needs someone like that or if he already has one he needs to listen and take their advice. His win over Wladimir Klitschko was a marvellous achievement but almost everything he has done or said since has soiled that achievement. Same old, same old WBA. They took Guillermo Rigondeaux’s super bantam title away for not defending in a timely manner as he had gone 11 months without making a title defence. They declared him to be Champion in Recess. The real reason they took his title away was so that the Carl Frampton vs. Scott Quigg fight could be a genuine unification match. It could not be that as long as Rigondeaux was super champion and Quigg was only the holder of their secondary title. With the unification sanction fee in their pocket they have now taken Rigondeaux out the little recess they hid him in and he is super champion again. They stripped him in November 2015 for not defending his title and six months later they reinstate him. He has still not defended the title but now it has been 17 months since his last defence. What cynical manipulation. To yet again illustrate that sanctioning fees come before common sense instead of ordering Rigondeaux to defend against interim champion Moises Flores, resulting in only one sanctioning fee, they are going to allow Rigondeaux to defend against either James Dickens or Jamie McDonnell. Flores will defend the interim title against IBO champion Paulus Ambunda with the winner fighting the winner of the Rigondeaux vs. Dickens/ McDonnell match and it is sanctioning fees galore and they are actually trumpeting about what a marvellous thing they are doing. Just to make the whole thing more ridiculous and to show the WBA don’t have a patent on cynicism only a few days after they declared Rigondeaux “Champion in Recess” he fought for and won the WBC International Silver title. Now according to an interview Mauricio Sulaiman gave to Boxing News the Silver title are for those not yet ready to challenge for the full title. Rigondeaux not yet ready to fight for the WBC International title or even the full world title? What rubbish they pour out- and then hope you will forget they said it just like Jose Sulaiman saying no more interim titles. How the web becomes tangled. Yvon Mendy was instructed by the WBC to give up either his EBU title or his WBC International title as by holding the EBU title he holds the title of another organisation so he cannot keep both. Mendy has relinquished the WBC International title. In the same breath the WBC upgrades interim champion Gennady Golovkin to full champion. That’s the Gennady Golovkin who holds both the WBA and IBF titles who to the best of my knowledge are “other organisations” so they have different sets of rules for different titles and they wonder why people become cynical when they start telling us what highly principled people they are. Ok I am a bit jealous as I envy Mauricio’s Sulaiman’s accumulated air miles. The IBF can always be relied on to do a bit of rating jiggling. Most viewers were disappointed at the performance put up by Ivan Morales who hardly won a round when challenging Lee Haskins for the IBF bantam title at the weekend. The simple truth is he did not deserve to be challenging for the title. Last August he lost to Edgar Jimenez, a modest fighter with a 19-11-2 record. He came back with an inside the distance win in December over Manuel Jimenez. That was the fifth loss in a row by KO/TKO for Jimenez and Morales weighed 129 ½ lbs. Of course this poor form meant he was not rated by the IBF-well not until March when without fighting he was treated to a ride in the IBF ratings elevator and suddenly he is up at No 13 bantam. I have always trusted the CompuBox statistics and felt that they often gave a better picture of what had happened in a fight than the judge’s scores. My faith was shaken as I watched Saul Alvarez vs. Amir Khan. They had Alvarez throwing more punches and landing more punches than Khan in the five completed rounds. No way! It looks like another Shannon Briggs farce. He was supposed to fight a “real” opponent but the latest name is Croatian Jakov Gospic. This will prove nothing that we don’t already know i.e. Briggs can beat third rate opposition. Gospic is 3-7 in his last 10 fights with four of those losses by KO/TKO. The three guys he beat had combined records of 0-4. I tried to find where Gospic was in the BoxRec ratings but I gave up when he had still not shown when I got to No 200. He is coming in as a late replacement and went three rounds with Dereck Chisora so he is helping the show but beating him will prove nothing with regard to Briggs. Former Italian light heavy champion Mirko Ricci has a very chequered past and his latest escapade beats them all. According to the Italian police Ricci went to a woman’s house to settle a matter relating to 5000Euros of money from stolen drugs. When the matter was not resolved Ricci punched the woman and kidnapped her nine-year-old son threatening to kill him if he did get the money. The police carried out some raids and arrests and released the child. The Italian Boxing Federation issued a statement condemning Ricci’s actions and the police are drawing up charges. Ricci has a history of trouble having been involved in quite a bit of out of the ring violence. He was shot in the leg after winning the Italian title and he was involved in a riot following his loss to Serhiy Demchenko. A lot of talent going to waste. Yet another crazy return seems to be on the cards. Former WBC and European light heavy champion Graciano Rocchigiani has said he is going through various medical tests to get a licence to box. Rocchigiani is 52-years-old and has not fight since 2003. He famously brought the WBC to their knees and almost put them out of business. In 1998 Roy Jones stated that he had given up the WBC title so the WBC sanctioned Rocchigiani to fight Michael Nunn for the vacant title in Berlin. Suddenly Jones changed his minds and said he now decided he wanted to keep the title. However the fight for the vacant title had been sanctioned, the fee paid and it was on the day of the fight that Jose Sulaiman tried to back out and say the Rocchigiani-Nunn fight was not for the vacant title. Rocchigiani won the fight but the WBC took the belt from him and re-instated Jones as champion. Rocchigiani sued the WBC, won his case and was awarded damages of $31 million. A full settlement would have forced the WBC into bankruptcy and Rocchigiani would not have received any damages so he cut a deal for a much smaller figure to be paid over an extended period. The court also forced the WBC to backdate recognition of Rocchigiani as champion to when he beat Nunn. Rocchigiani’s aim in returning? A fight with Roy Jones naturally! Less surprising is that Arthur Abraham is fighting on. The former IBF and WBO champion will fight on the card topped by Tyrone Zeuge’s challenge to Giovanni De Carolis for the WBA secondary and UBO super middleweight titles in Berlin on 16 July. No opponent named yet. The idea of professional boxers competing at the Olympics might sound like a good idea if you work for the AIBA but they don’t have to face reality. Namibia has produced many good fighters but only two of their boxers have so far qualified for Rio. The remainder of those hoping to qualify did not manage to win through the African qualifier. There is a last chance qualifier in Baku next month but no Namibian boxers will go because their Boxing Federation can’t afford to send them. The two who have qualified will get the princely sum of $6,000 to help them prepare for Rio. What the AIBA is proposing both for Rio and for the future won’t just result in these guys having no chance of winning a medal it will result in them not even having a chance to qualify. The Olympic dream will die in the dust. The WBC has said it will disqualify from their ratings anyone who agrees to compete at the Olympics. The AIBA seems ready to go ahead with their plans for Rio with the Board expected to approve the resolution at a meeting on 1 June. It is said that the Director of the Philippines Boxing Association has already booked a place in the 64kg category for Manny Pacquiao. Former WBC cruiser champion Krzys Wlodarczyk is looking to get back into the picture. He faces Kai Kurzawa in Szczecin, Poland on 28 May and his aim is a shot at the winner of the Denis Lebedev vs. Victor Ramirez fight on Saturday. The WBA super bantam title recently stolen from-sorry I mean stripped from Carl Frampton will be contested by Venezuelan Nehomar Cermeno and Xiao Jun in Beijing on 24 June. Cermeno is the interim champion and Jun is a very useful fighter. On the same show Javier Fortuna defends his secondary WBA super feather title against Jason Sosa. title Some people just do not seem to get the hang of a ring nickname. It is supposed to reflect power, speed, and agility. It should be thunder or dynamite or speedy etc. but “Chocolate Hills!! Come on Ricky Sismundo you put Dierry Jean down twice. You can’t carry around a nickname like that. Look at Carlos Cuenca, he had the sense to change his name from “Fred Astaire” to “El Distinto”. Now I don’t quite know what “El Distinto” translates to but it has to be better for a boxer than Fred Astaire. Just had a thought if Cuenca fights “Canelo” it could be billed as Fred Astaire vs. Ginger….no it doesn’t quite work. Finally congratulations to senator Pacquiao who has just been voted into a seat in the Philippines senate. Another win on a great record. As always, a huge thanks to Eric Armit sending us this! So is it going to be Manny Pacquiao or Tim Bradley who emerges as the winner? That’s the big question this weekend. They are 1-1 in their series and no matter what the result I don’t believe there will be a Pacquiao vs. Bradley IV. Pacquiao is the favourite but you can never rule out Bradley. Two of the factors to ponder are Teddy Atlas and Old Father Time. We won’t know what Atlas has brought to the table until the fight is over. Will he just try to add something to the basic Bradley or try drastic change to produce a new Bradley? The first is the more likely but will it be enough? Old Father Time? Well they are both two years older than when they last fought each other. Two years is just additional maturity when you are 30 going to 32 as Bradley has done but it is extra age when you go from 35 to 37 as Pacquiao has. In addition Bradley has been marginally more active having fought and won twice last year over Jessie Vargas and Brandon Rios with the Rios fight being in November. Pacquiao has fought just once in the last nine months. Factors that could favour Bradley but not enough for me to change my opinion that Pacquiao will emerge the winner but win or lose I see this as Manny’s last fight-unless Floyd Mayweather deigns to grace us with his presence one more time. Oh please not that.
What a weekend for great fights. On the Pacquiao vs. Bradley undercard we will find out if Arthur Abraham can fight outside Germany as 3 of his 4 losses have come against Andre Dirrell and Andre Ward in the USA and Carl Froch in Finland. I fancy Gilberto Ramirez to win this one and it will be interesting to see if Oscar Valdez can beat Evgeny Gradovich for the WBO NABO title to make it a good night for Mexico. Of course there is the huge Charles Martin vs. Anthony Joshua fight in London. I go for Joshua but people are seriously underestimating Martin. He looked bad against Vyacheslav Glazkov but he is better than that. He is clever and does have a punch but can be a lazy fighter and if anything Joshua has generally fought better opposition. The show also has Lee Selby vs. Eric Hunter and Jaime McDonnell vs. Fernando Vargas and Matthew Macklin vs. Brian Rose and of course the pro debut for Conor Benn the son of Nigel. Going back to Abraham, also appearing on that card is Abraham’s young stable mate Leon Bauer. The 17-year-old super middle is the youngest pro in Germany and will become the youngest pro ever to fight in Las Vegas. Back in Germany another Sauerland fighter, Jack Culcay, puts his interim WBA super welter on the line against Jean Carlos Prada. The WBA continues to be consistent. Prada has not had a fight for almost 15 months but suddenly pressed the WBA ratings elevator and is now No 13-lucky for some. Adrien Broner did his image no good by failing to make the weight for his defence of the WBA super light title against Ashley Theophane. It was reported that he was 0.4lbs over the limit but did not even bother to try to take off the excess. That shows an arrogant disrespect to his opponent to the WBA, TV and the fans. Late last year the WBA upgraded him from secondary champion to “Super” champion and in return he symbolically threw their “Super” title into the trash can. Any time a fighter fails to make the weight for a fight he is in breach of contract. In any other business that can have serious consequences but not in boxing. We recently had Randy Caballero coming in 5 ½lbs over the contract weight for an IBF title fight against Lee Haskins and Haskins exercised his right not to fight an overweight contest. That breach of contract by Caballero robbed TV of a title fight they had advertised and sold to the public, it robbed the promoter of a title fight he had sold tickets for and robbed the fans of a fight they had paid for as a ticket is a contract between the promoter and the fans. But this breach is just accepted by all concerned with a shrug of the shoulders. Going back to Broner it is not the first time he has breached his contract. He was 3 ½ lbs overweight when he was supposed to fight Vicente Escobedo for the vacant WBO super feather title in 2012. Until there are severe consequences fighters will continue to come over the contract weight. I would like to see someone sue a fighter who does that for breach of contract just as a test case. Fines are an obvious response but it would good to think that the sanctioning body involved would put a ban on the fighter fighting for their title for 5 years, but that is not going to happen and, since none of the sanctioning bodies work together, the fighter could fight for another title just a few months later. As for Broner he is a problem to TV, to promoters and of course now also to the police. That’s “The Problem”. It was good news for everyone that Nick Blackwell emerged from his induced coma and seems to be on the way to recovery. The fight showed again the heavy responsibility for the safety of fighters that rests on a referee’s shoulders. Choosing the right time to stop a fight means treading the sometimes very thin line that covers too early, just right and too late. We are lucky in that we can claim foresight and use hindsight when making our judgement but the referee has the benefit of neither. His decision is a there and then judgement and unless he hits that middle “just right” band he is going to be criticised in varying degrees. In the case of Eubank vs. Blackwell Nick took a lot of punishment but the referee Victor Loughlin was carefully monitoring when Blackwell was under fire on the ropes and when Loughlin was “hovering” Blackwell either fought his way off the ropes or threw a few punches back to show he was still in the fight. Until the sudden swelling over Blackwell’s left eye it looked as though the fight would go the full twelve rounds as both fighters were tiring and without the benefit of hindsight I felt it was a well timed stoppage by an experienced referee. Drug testing is another subject that his hit the headlines recently with allegations that Lucas Brown gave a positive test after his title win over Ruslan Chagaev in Grozny. That follows the allegations that Olanrewaju Durodola gave a positive test after beating Dmitry Kudryashov in Russia and Mariusz Wach also did after his fight with Alex Povetkin so it is a hot subject right now. Browne knew and agreed that VADA would be overseeing the testing and he took a test when he arrived in Grozny which showed no banned substances. He also knew that there would be a post fight test and it would be the height of stupidity for him to have taken a banned substance after that pre-fight test and both Browne and the people around him are experienced and knowledgeable. On the other hand the VADA are an un-affiliated world respected organisation so have no axe to grind for Chagaev’s team. It would seem the best way of clearing this would be to have Browne’s B sample tested but not unreasonably he maintains that if the first had been tampered there is no reason to believe the second would not also have been “doctored”. It also does not inspire confidence in the officials in Grozny that I noted in my fight report that the round where Browne was knocked down and in trouble overran by 18 seconds. In the cases of Durodola and Wach things were significantly different. The WBC refused to accept the positive tests in their A samples due to serious doubts over compliance with procedures by the Russian Anti-Doping Agency (RUSADA) and the VADA were not involved. The WBC also saw no benefit in having the B samples tested for the same reason, the doubts over compliance with procedures. I do not believe for one minute that Browne took a banned substance but I also believe in the integrity of the VADA so I don’t know a way of resolving this but then it is the WBA’s problem and not mine thankfully. It does however mean that some special arrangements will have to be put in place for testing in the WBC title fight in Russia between Deontay Wilder and Alex Povetkin. The Russian promoter has said that VADA will be used to oversee the testing. However the Russian Boxing Federation has not confirmed this and to put a bit of edge into the whole thing Wilder said after Povetkin’s win over Mike Perez “he’s on some kind of steroids but you know that’s just my opinion”. Being a boxer in Zimbabwe is almost impossible which is why Charles Manyuchi has had to do almost all of his fighting either in Zambia or some other guy’s backyard. A 14-0-1 run has earned him a fight with Russian Dmitry Mikhaylenko (21-0) for the WBC Silver title at welterweight. Naturally Manyuchi will have to travel to Russia for the fight. He is WBC No 9 and Mikhaylenko No 10 so victory will not get either of them a fight with Danny Garcia but they can dream. Still on Africa/Africans two of Ghana’s best fighters, Joshua Clottey and Joseph Agbeko are both returning to action on 29 April in Accra on the “Legendary Night of Boxing. Proposed matches are Clottey vs. Brazilian Anderson Clayton and Agbeko vs. Filipino Cris Alfante. Clottey has said he will fight for two more years and then retire. There is quite a bit of soul searching going on in Ghana. This nation which has produced so many good boxers-and some great ones-faces the prospect of having no fighters at the Olympics for the first time in 20 years. The “Black Bombers” National team failed to get any fighters through the African Olympic qualification tournament and may not even feel it worth spending the money to send any of their boxers to the Final World Olympic Qualifying tournament in Baku. Football is the No 1 sport in Ghana as with most African countries so boxing often gets starved of funds from the Government. The President of the Ghana Amateur Boxing Federation incurred the anger of the team by suggesting that they failed due to their request for a per-diem whilst at the African qualifier. I am going to throw away my chance of qualifying for the Olympics because you won’t give me any pocket money! Somehow I don’t think so. Still on Africa Boxing South Africa (BSA) announced they have appointed a new financial officer in Thabang Moses. They have still not filled the Chief Executive slot but one can only hope they have done more due diligence over this position than they have in the past. Their previous financial officer was dismissed for “financial irregularities”. The Chief Executive Officer post was to have been filled by the end of last year but is still vacant. Due diligence seems to have been on holiday when their last CEO was sacked last year after a tribunal found him guilty of 10 of 14 charges five of them involving “gross dishonesty” and the man appointed as acting CEO resigned while on suspension amid several allegations of corruption, fraud and mismanagement-and the BSA then gave him a licence to train and manage boxers! I wonder if anyone did due diligence on the Sports Minister? Russian promoter Andrei Ryabinski has said he is working with the Russian Boxing Federation and Kathy Duva to get the next title defence for Sergey Kovalev in Moscow in June. Nothing settled yet but that is the aim. Good looking all-French clash will see Guillaume Frenois (40-1) face Samir Ziani (21-2-1) for the vacant European super feather title with purse bids due on Monday. It also looks as though the WBA minimum title fight between new champion Byron Rojas and No 1 Knockout CP Freshmart could also have to go to purse offers. The agent for the Thai has offered Rojas $45,000 tax free plus TV rights which could add between $10-15000 to the pot. This is naturally much higher than the reported $15,000 Rojas as the challenger was paid for the Hekkie Budler fight. No deal yet as Rojas’s team want the fight in Nicaragua and say they are prepared to put $100,000 on the table. They will both have to put their money where their mouth is it comes to purse offers. How boxing has changed. Sven Ottke, the former undefeated IBF and WBA super middle champion, he was 34-0 at the end of his career, feels that one of the fighters he is training is going to become a world champion. It is Tunisian-born, German-based Ikram Kerwat who is 5-0 and fights for the vacant WBC International female title on the Culcay vs. Prada bill on Saturday. There were no female champions when Sven retired in March 2004 with the WBC crowning their first champion in 2005 but now we have some all-female shows as they go from strength to strength. --- As always a huge thanks to Eric for sending us his work. |
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