Wladimir Klitschko crawls on the mat during the fifth round at the Mandalay Bay Resort Hotel & Casino in Las Vegas, April 10, 2004 as the corner for Lamon Brewster takes out his mouthpiece.
Photo: AP
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No Boxing Champ for Two More Years
It was officially announced on Monday that International Boxing Federation heavyweight champion Vladimir Klitschko of Ukraine would fight his next match on July 7 in Cologne against American Lamon Brewster. Klitschko and Brewster last faced off in 2004 for the World Boxing Organization title, when, after four rounds of excellent fighting, Klitschko suddenly was knocked out in the fifth.
A victory against the American would thus be pleasant for Klitschko, but it will not bring him much closer to his often declared goal of becoming absolute champion. The last heavyweight to hold all the titles was Lennox Lewis in 1999.
After Lewis retired in 2004, people began to say that there was a crisis among the heavyweights and champion status was losing its prestige. Indeed, none of the titles is worth more than $10 million, and competition for them is not steep.
Now well-known promoter Don King has proposed organizing a cycle of fights to enable one fighter to win all four titles. He made this suggestion after Ruslan Chagaev beat Nikolay Valuev in Stuttgart on Saturday, and promised to raise $30 million for the event.
This plan is complicated by the fact that it will take about two years for that champion to emerge, and that he will not be American. Since most of the money for boxing comes from the United States, the categories in which Americans are competing receive the best financing.
www.kommersant.com
All the Article in Russian as of Apr. 18, 2007
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