Promoter Eddie Hearn says he has “nearly” agreed on an opponent for Raymond Ford to be the co-feature on the April Atlantic City bill, headlined by Jaron Ennis and Eimantas Stanionis.

Ennis is the IBF welterweight champion while Stanionis holds the WBA title, and they will fight on April 12 at Boardwalk Hall.

Former junior lightweight champion Ford, from Camden, defeated Orlando Gonzalez in November as he returned from the first loss of his career, to Liverppol’s Nick Ball.

It is thought that another Liiverppol fighter, Jazza Dickens – fresh off a big win over Zelfa Barrett, who subsequently joined up with trainer Joe Gallagher – has been offered the Ford fight.

“Eduardo] Nunez is fighting the Japanese [Masanori Rikishi] for the [vacant IBF] world title. That’ll be in May,” said Hearn. “So we’ve been looking for a good fight for Ray. Ray wants to fight Nunez. There’s three or four people in the mix. Abraham Nova, Henry LeBron, Christopher Diaz, a few different guys we’re talking to. We want a good fight. Basically, the plan is Nunez versus Rikishi, if Nunez wins the world title, Nunez v Ford for the world title.” 

Hearn also said the Atlantic City bill, set to be announced in full next week, would feature “a really good fight [at junior featherweight] between Mexican Arturo Cardenas and Christian Carto, from Philadelphia.”