More on the politics of boxing. Sometimes it lends itself to farcical situations. The WBO Light Heavyweight Title is now vacant thanks to Canelo Alvarez handing in the Championship he took from Sergey Kovalev last November. In order to fill the void, the WBO have ordered two fights with the respective winners to face each other for the full Title. Gilberto Ramirez is to meet Eleider Alvarez and Umar Salamov has been ordered to fight Maxim Vlasov.
The word is that Gilberto Ramirez might not make it to the starting gate against Eleider Alvarez, so someone else will need to take his place.That man looks as though it might be Anthony Yarde. But Anthony Yarde and his team had a problem. One of the WBO rules says that a newly beaten title challenger can't contest an elimination bout, and Yarde had just been defeated by Kovalev. (Kovelev has since lost the title to Canelo.)
So Yarde needed a quick, easy win. This is where politics can plunge the sport of boxing to depths that equate to little more than complete and utter bullshit. A couple of days ago Frank Warren pitched Anthony Yarde into the ring to fulfill his WBO obligations. Fight and win. No chances were takes. The fight took place in what looked like a gym, against a gent named Diego Jair Ramirez who entered the 6 round fight with a record of 4-49-3. 3 of those wins were against men making their debut and the other against a man with a record of 2-3-0.
What a sad state of affairs.
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