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Unbeaten Matchroom welterweight Florian “The Albanian King” Marku (11-0-1, 7 KOs) fights Miguel “Maquina” Parra Ramirez (21-2-1, 14 KOs) tonight at the Air Albania Stadium in Tirana, Albania, with the WBC silver title at stake. A capacity crowd of 20,000+ fans is expected. Marku should make his entrance to the ring around 8:30PM UK time (3:30PM ET/12:30PM PT US time).

British fans can catch the fight for free via the Sky Sports Boxing YouTube channel and the Sky Sports Boxing Facebook page. The full 11-bout card can be watched in the US, UK, and Ireland via FITE.tv.

By Gabriel F. Cordero

On July 13, TMZ reported that boxing legend George Foreman claimed two women have made up stories that he sexually abused them in an effort to extort him out of millions of dollars. It’s now reported that the women have filed separate lawsuits against Big George seeking unspecified damages for alleged incidents that would have taken place nearly 50 years ago when they were both minors. Foreman, 73, has denied the allegations.

By Ray Wheatley – World of Boxing

WBC heavyweight champion Tyson Fury has given promoters a seven-day deadline to make an offer for an undisputed heavyweight title bout against WBA, WBO, IBF heavyweight champion Oleksandr Usyk.

“For all these suitors out there that want to make the fight, I’m going to give you all seven days until September 1st to come up with the money. If not, thank you very much, it’s been a blast, I’m retired,” Fury said on social media.

He added, “All offers submitted must be to my lawyer Robert Davis in writing with proof of funds. So let the games begin. Boom!”

Former unified heavyweight champion Andy “The Destroyer” Ruiz Jr. held a media workout at his gym in the San Diego area on Wednesday as he prepares to face top contender Luis “King Kong” Ortiz in a WBC heavyweight title eliminator that headlines a FOX Sports PBC Pay-Per-View on September 4 in Labor Day weekend action at Crypto.com Arena in Los Angeles.

Andy Ruiz Jr:  “I’m feeling really good. The hard work has already paid off and now it’s just time to have fun on September 4. We’re going to let it all out in the ring. Me and Ortiz are coming to be champions, so you know it’s going to be a hell of a fight.

“I’m just ready. I had a long training camp. I know what Ortiz is bringing to the ring and I know what I’m capable of. I just have to stay focused and execute. Continue reading “Andy Ruiz Training Camp Quotes”

The World Boxing Association (WBA) Championships Committee has approved a joint permit requested by Matchroom Boxing and TGB Promotions to allow featherweight super champion Leo Santa Cruz to face Rey Vargas in a unification fight and regular featherweight champion Leigh Wood to make a defense against Mauricio Lara.

Both fights were approved with the condition that the super champion will face the regular champion to define the sole champion of the category within 120 days after the fight between Santa Cruz and Vargas. Continue reading “WBA approves Santa Cruz-Vargas, Wood-Lara”

The Purse bid for the World Boxing Association (WBA) light heavyweight world championship bout between Dmitry Bivol and mandatory challenger Gilberto Ramirez, which was scheduled to take place last Sunday, was canceled as both parties reached an agreement.

Both fighters’ teams informed the WBA Championships Committee that the fight will take place on November 5 in the United Arab Emirates and that full details will be provided in the coming days. The signed contracts will be sent soon within the deadlines established by the WBA for these type of cases.

Tito Mercado 141.6 vs Alfredo Rodolfo Blanco 142
Sonny Robledo 144 vs Darynn Leyva 144.2
Jesikah Guerra 158.2 vs Seta Vatuvei 153.8
Caresse Archer 171 vs Saad Ul-Hassan 169.4
Rene Moreno 133.8 vs Charles Clark 133.4
Antonio Garcia 154.8 vs Izaiah Vargas 154.2
Craig Wilkerson 175 vs Alex Fugon 171.8

Venue: The Hangar at OC Fair & Event Center in Costa Mesa CA
Promoter: Englebrecht Promotions & Events
TV: FITE PPV
Doors at 6pm, show starts at 7:05pm
SOLD OUT

The World Boxing Association (WBA) Championships Committee, in another decision following the world title reduction plan, ordered the bout between WBA cruiserweight champion Arsen Goulamirian and his mandatory challenger Aleksei Egorov. Egorov is ranked number two and was chosen after Ryad Merhy, who was originally scheduled to face Goulamirian to decide the sole champion of the category, decided not to fulfill the bout.

Now, the champion must face his mandatory challenger, having gone two years and eight months without doing so and having been granted two optional defenses during that time. Continue reading “WBA orders Goulamirian-Egorov”

Thrives under Santa Marta Beach heat

Unbeaten featherweight prospect Dominique Francis (13-0, 9 KOs) of Miami, Florida successfully defeated local favorite Manuel Felipe Gonzalez (11-3, 11 KOs) of Colombia by ten round unanimous decision. The bout took place Wednesday morning in the highly popular beach tourist city of Santa Marta in Colombia. The official scores were all in favor to Francis 100-90, 99-91, and 98-92. Continue reading “Francis victorious, remains unbeaten”

ESPN+ will stream the heavyweight clash between top contenders Joe Joyce (14-0, 13 KOs) and Joseph Parker (30-2, 21 KOs) on September 24 from the AO Arena in Manchester, England. The stream also feature female champion Amanda Serrano (42-2-1, 30 KOs), who will attempt to unify her WBO and WBC featherweight titles against unbeaten IBF champion Sarah Mahfoud (11-0, 3 KOs). Joyce-Parker will be broadcast live in the UK on BT Sport Box Office.

An interesting lightweight bout will headline RDR Promotions debut on September 23 at The Clarion Hotel in Essington, Pennsylvania, as ShoBox alum Nahir Albright (14-2, 7 KOs) will take on undefeated Estivan Falcao (11-0, 6 KOs) in a bout scheduled for six-rounds. Falco is the brother of Brazil’s Olympic Silver Medal winner Esquiva Falcao (30-0 as a pro) and Bronze Medal winner Yamaguchi Falcao (21-1-1 as a pro). Continue reading “Boxing back in Essington, PA”

The WBA world title final eliminator clash between Hughie Fury and Michael “The Bounty” Hunter now has a new date confirmed. The two are set to face off at the Resorts World Arena in Birmingham, England on Saturday, October 29th with the winner emerging as the next contender to challenge for the WBA heavyweight title held by Daniel Dubois.

Fury is (26-3, 15 KOs) and ranked at #4 in the WBA, Hunter is (20-1-2, 14 KOs) and rated WBA #2. They were scheduled to fight in July, but the bout was postponed after Fury fell ill during training camp.

By Ray Wheatley – World of Boxing

The camps of Tyson Fury and Oleksandr Usyk are reportedly already in negotiations for a potential undisputed heavyweight championship bout in Saudi Arabia. Per the Daily Mail, Prince Mohammad Abdulaziz, the Saudi minister for sport, is on the record as saying “we are very interested in the fight.”

The mega-bout would likely take place in the city of Riyadh on December 17. The 2022 World Cup final is slated to take place the next day in nearby Qatar. The combination of the epic Fury-Usyk showdown and the World Cup final on the same weekend would be huge for the sporting profile of the Middle East.

In part three of this four-part interview with Fightnews.com®, ring legend Bernard Hopkins pulls no punches as he prepares to embark on the biggest fight of his career outside the ring.

By Jeff Zimmerman

Bernard Hopkins is confident that the Spence-Crawford fight will take place, which would delay a title shot for Golden Boy’s rising star Vergil Ortiz Jr. Ortiz Jr. has been the WBO mandatory to Crawford’s title for quite some time.

“Let me tell you why that fight is not going to fall through,” Hopkins explained. First, Crawford is not dumb. He’s very, very intelligent and smart out of the ring just as well as in the ring. Second, they are going to ask too much from him to come to the PBC regime, Al Haymon. He doesn’t want to be a part of that, he just wants to fight. So, he doesn’t want to be a part of the PBC. ‘I am who I am. I got a title; I’m just coming with this.’ He doesn’t want to be locked in. I don’t blame him. He just got out of a situation. Why do you think he made that move to do that move?

“The only thing Terence Crawford needs for real, is a good mouthpiece that knows what the hell he’s doing and knows his worth like he knows it. He will save a whole lot of money and some headaches. So, to me and the way I know how they talk about the old bushy hair King, but a lot of them in there and want to be just like Don King in a different way. And they cover up by saying we pay our fighters a lot more than everybody and they keep all the money, that’s just a smoke screen. That’s a jab and then a right hand knocks you out. I know the game. I know the game.” Continue reading “Bernard Hopkins: No Punches Pulled, Part 3”

Tuto Zabala’s All Star Boxing, Inc has joined forces once again with Producciones Deportivas and will return to Mexico this Friday, August 26 at the beautiful Foro ZINA in Zinacantepec. Mexicans Ernesto Salcedo (13-2, 10 KOs) and Hytan Ramos (11-5-2, 3 KOs) will headline the show in a rematch fight with the vacant World Boxing Council FECARBOX super bantamweight title at stake. Continue reading “All Star Boxing returns to Mexico this Friday”

Unbeaten featherweight prospect Dominique Francis (12-0, 9 KOs) of Miami, Florida takes on local favorite Manuel Felipe Gonzalez (11-2, 11 KOs) of Colombia. The 10 round bout will take place Wednesday morning in the highly popular beach tourist city of Santa Marta in Colombia. This will be the third time Francis has fought in Santa Marta having previously impressively scored two knockouts. The ripped and ready Francis is stepping up versus the hard punching Gonzalez who has a 100% knockout percent. His corner will be manned by his father Smith Francis and trainer Derick Santos. Both fighters made the contracted weight on Tuesday.

By Mark Vaz

Jimmy Farrell, 69, a well-known and highly respected trainer from Quincy, MA passed away Monday after a long battle with cancer. Born in nearby Rockland, MA, Farrell campaigned in the 1970’s in the featherweight division as a pro, retiring with a record of 17-4-3, 6 KOs. Farrell trained under his father the late Jim Farrell, Sr, also a Boston area promoter, as well as hall of famer Cus D’Amato in Catskill, NY.

Jimmy operated several gyms in Quincy area over the years during a career that spanned nearly five decades and produced over 40 amateur champions as well as dozens of professionals, including Mark DeLuca, Ryan Kielczewski, Steve Vukosa, Chris and Vinnie Traietti, Nick and Mike Morganelli and Nick Cyr. Continue reading “Trainer Jimmy Farrell passes”

By Mauricio Sulaimán
Son of José Sulaimán and president of the WBC

Ready to enter the last quarter of 2022 with an incredible closing plan for this year that has been superb for all the boxing world.

We have experienced action inside and outside the ring, the World Boxing Council platform has been extremely active, including the participation of thousands of people who make up this great family and this is a reason to celebrate, since just two years ago we lived with enormous concern, without knowing what would happen next with our world, derived from a pandemic that caused devastating effects to all.

Boxing was essential for the lives of millions of people to have hope, inspiration and confidence that things would continue, and life would return to normal. Boxing took the initiative and showed the world it could be done.

Boxing shows were held without an audience in the famous bubbles of the United States, Mexico, Nicaragua, England and some other countries; The WBC Talks kept the boxing and sports community entertained and informed for months; The virtual WBC Convention that was held in 2020 instead of doing the easy thing of throwing in the towel and cancelling that annual meeting, where all the important points for the administration of our organization are discussed. So today it only remains to look forward and continue with great events in the ring as well as in society. Continue reading “A spectacular end of the year is coming!”

Dignity Health Sports Park in Carson, California, will be the site where unbeaten super welterweight Sebastian “The Towering Inferno’’ Fundora defends his WBC interim title against former title challenger Carlos Ocampo live on Showtime October 8.

Tickets for the event, which is promoted by TGB Promotions and Sampson Boxing, go on sale tomorrow, Wednesday, August 24 at noon.

Star Boxing has announced that it has signed Ivan “El Terrible” Redkach (26-6-1 18 KOs) to an exclusive promotional agreement. He will be campaigning at 135 lbs moving forward. Redkach is excited to get back in the ring, “For some reason, my career froze for a year. I’ve had a good rest and I didn’t sit still waiting for my time. I trained hard for a year, being told there is a fight, then there would be no fight.

“Boxing is my job, it’s my life. I’ve been in boxing since I am 6 years old, and I’ve come a good way. I have the experience. There have been ups and downs, but I’ll be back in the ring soon and you’ll see my desire to win. I’m very grateful to Star Boxing and Joe DeGuardia to further my career. Together we’ll become world champion.”

On August 13, 42-year-old former heavyweight title challenger Kevin “Kingpin” Johnson (35-20-1, 9 KOs) went the eight round distance with unbeaten Igor Shevadzutskiy (10-0, 8 KOs), and even gave Shevadzutskiy some problems. On Saturday, Kingpin returns in another eight-rounder against another unbeaten fighter in Victor Faust (9-0, 7 KOs). The event takes place at the ECB Boxgym in Hamburg, Germany.

Faust, also known as Victor Vykhryst, will be fighting for the first time since he went life and death with Iago Kiladze in January. He was supposed to fight two weeks ago, but his opponent pulled out with COVID.

“I’m going to end the fight early and not go the full distance with Johnson!” proclaimed Faust.

In part two of this four-part interview with Fightnews.com®, ring legend Bernard Hopkins pulls no punches as he prepares to embark on the biggest fight of his career outside the ring.

By Jeff Zimmerman

The super fight of Spence-Crawford is still not on the calendar [although media reports say November is targeted for the undisputed welterweight title]. Hopkins, however, gives high praise to WBO champion Terence Crawford and believes he is the guy to beat at 147.

“I respect the fighter that gets on TV or any other chance he gets to make it known [he wants to fight],” said Hopkins. The only person I can say right now, I’m 100% serious, then saying some BS on social media that you are willing to do this or do that. No, you’re not. You have to listen to your master. You got to listen to who’s thinking for you before you think for yourself.

“I respect Terence Crawford man. Not only has he shown up to support his stablemates, but he has shown up to say, ‘hey guys, I’m here, I got my eyes on y’all.’ And he hasn’t shown up sinning and grinning, he has shown up, ‘I’m here, I’m respected and I’m getting respect and I’ll give it back, I’m here.’” Continue reading “Bernard Hopkins: No Punches Pulled, Part 2”

By Ray Wheatley – World of Boxing

Undisputed lightweight world champion Devin “The Dream” Haney (in Los Angeles) and “Ferocious” George Kambosos Jr. (in Melbourne) participated on a split feed kick-off press conference to kickoff their October 15 (October 16 in Australia) rematch at Rod Laver Arena in Melbourne, Australia. Haney-Kambosos 2 will be broadcast in prime time in the United States, live on ESPN, ESPN Deportes & ESPN+ and live on Main Event and Kayo in Australia.

While the first fight was one-sided in Haney’s favor, Hall of Fame promoter Bob Arum says George Kambosos warns people not to count out Kambosos.

“If he approaches the fight differently, he has a good, good chance,” Arum said to FoxSports. “If he fights the same fight that he fought last time, he has no chance. We’ll have to see which George Kambosos shows up. The one who fought and beat Teofimo Lopez or the one who fought from the outside and wasn’t aggressive against Devin Haney.” Continue reading “Haney-Kambosos 2 Kick-Off Press Conference”

The World Boxing Council has announced that its 60th annual convention will take place in Acapulco, one of the most beautiful beach attractions in the world. Arrival and welcome cocktails will be Sunday, November 6 and the official opening ceremony takes place on Monday November 7. The final day of activities and departure is Friday November 11.

Mental health of boxers will be the main topic to be discussed during the medical seminar to be held at the World Boxing Association (WBA) Centennial Convention, which will take place at the Caribe Royale Hotel in Orlando, Florida, from December 11-14. The WBA and its Medical Committee will have as its main banner a problem that is affecting many fighters today and that needs to be watched closely and treated properly.

“The mental health of our athletes will be the central theme of the Medical Seminar of our WBA Centennial Convention, to be held next December in Orlando, Florida,” said WBA President Gilberto Jesus Mendoza.

There have been several cases recently among very prominent names who have had to withdraw from fights, take extended breaks and even think about retirement due to their situation, which makes it necessary to address the issue in a more direct way. Continue reading “WBA Centennial Convention to focus on mental health”