QUEBEC | After once again retaining his three light heavyweight world championship titles (175 lbs) by defeating Callum Smith on Saturday, what awaits Artur Beterbiev?
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“He has just completed 16 weeks of training camp, we are going to let him breathe a little and then there is Ramadan coming up in March and then we can talk with the people at Top Rank,” said his trainer, Marc Ramsay, after Saturday night’s fight.
The desire is obviously to face Dmitry Bivol (22-0-0, 11 KOs), another Russian, who holds the WBA title, the only one who escapes Beterbiev (20-0-0, 20 K .-O.).
During the press day on Thursday, English promoter Eddie Hearn made it clear that there was a contract for a possible fight between the two compatriots.
“I don’t know how he can say that, I didn’t sign anything,” said Beterbiev, smiling.
The fact remains that this is the fight that everyone wants to see, it was on our wish list for the new year. And when it does happen, you’ll most likely need to book your tickets to Saudi Arabia if you want to attend in person.
Good for Mbilli
Saturday evening was also good for Christian Mbilli (26-0-0, 22 KOs), who devoured Rohan Murdock, who was forced to retire because he received so many blows.
Mbilli plays in the super-middleweight (168 lbs), a category which is firmly locked by Canelo Alvarez (60-2-2, 39 KOs), the world champion of the four major boxing federations. But it was a serious message that Mbilli sent with his performance against Murdock.
“For sure Canelo has watched it or he will watch it in the next few days. Is it positive? I don’t know,” said Antonin Décarie of Eye of the Tiger Management. “Television will turn on him, Americans will want to see him again. Christian may not yet have the notoriety of Canelo, but sometimes a great performance can push the champion away.”
Everyone would like to see Mbilli face Alvarez or David Benavidez. The person concerned knows that it will not be easy and does not consider that it would be risky to do so.
“The real question is them, what risks are they willing to take to confront me. I represent too much risk compared to the benefits they can get. Do they have the will to confront me?
Christian Mbilli gave a performance which should open doors for him.
Courtesy Eye of the Tiger management/Vincent Ethier
An option
Between the branches, it is whispered that Mbilli could first face the American Caleb Plant (22-2-0, 13 KOs), which he would not hate. Plant is behind him in all rankings, but is a high quality opponent.
“I would dream [de ça]. It would be an absolute joy to face Caleb Plant. He’s an opponent that I have in my sights, I watch his fights and I say to myself: “he wouldn’t spend 10 rounds with me”,” Mbilli confided on Saturday evening.
What we know at Eye of the Tiger is that his performance at the Videotron Center will open doors for him.
“We had a lot of discussions with the WBC. They didn’t promise us anything, but they told us that if he delivered the goods, they would talk to us again.”
What party!
We must also take our hat off to the Quebec boxing fans who helped establish a new record for a gala presented at the Videotron Center. There were 10,031 of them despite the bad weather.
It must be said that everything was in place for a successful evening. The card was as tempting as could be and the fights delivered on their promises. We had an exciting evening from start to finish and even the fight imposed by Top Rank, which featured the Australian Jason Moloney, who struggled to defend his WBO bantamweight belt (118 lbs) against the American Saul Sanchez, brought the crowd to their feet.
“I’ve never had a gala that was better than this one with this atmosphere. Quebec boxing shone. If I had to give a grade on all facets, I would say A+,” proudly said the president of Eye of the Tiger Management at the end of the evening.