photo credit © Mark Robinson/Matchroom Boxing
A night of rematches remains intact but now without its planned co-feature.
Unbeaten prospect Felix Cash was forced to withdraw from a scheduled fight with Vaughn Alexander, after continuing to struggle with a stomach virus that has plagued him throughout fight week. The 29-year-old Brit announced the development late Saturday morning, just hours before their ten-round regional middleweight title fight was due to serve as the chief support on a DAZN show from The O2 in London.
"I want to address the situation here before any speculation,” Cash stated on his verified Instagram account on Saturday. “I have completed a 12-week camp, the camp was great with my team, sparring went to plan. Wednesday during fight week I had a stomach bug that felt nothing out of the ordinary, but during some of my last training sessions before the weigh in the bug symptoms have grown worse.
“Before the weigh in I vomited multiple times which was concerning to me and my team. We then took a view to get on the scales and rehydrate. I made weight inside the limit as planned and once rehydrated was hoping for the symptoms to relax. Unfortunately, the symptoms grew worse, I couldn’t keep any food or liquids down and this went on [throughout] the night, during my sleep and in the morning when I woke up.”
Cash participated in all fight week functions, up to and including Friday’s final weigh-in where he weighed just inside the middleweight limit at 159.9 pounds. Everything appeared fine for his second fight of 2022, five months after surviving two knockdowns and a cut to outpoint unbeaten Magomed Madiev this past February at Muswell Hill’s Alexandra Palace. It marked his second straight win over an unbeaten opponent, having scored a sensational third-round stoppage victory over Denzel Bentley last April.
Things appeared set even as recent as the morning of the fight, with Cash including a post on his IG Live story captioned “Fight Day!!” from another account at roughly 8:00 am local time. It came just as the unbeaten boxer was medically informed that going through with the fight would be a health hazard.
“Me and my team took professional advice from a GP [general practitioner]. The GP has highly advised for us not to participate in the fight,” noted Cash. “As a team we have taken that advice and will recover, train and go again on the next available Matchroom [b]ill. This is a hard pill to swallow and against my pride, but I have an experienced team around me who advise and support me at the highest level and ultimately protect me.
“I want to say thank you to my team for the time spent during camp and fight week. Thank you Matchroom Boxing and to my opponent for coming over on short notice, we both know this is a real fight and one where we both need to be 100% at our best to win.”
The development leaves St. Louis’ Alexander without a fight, and one of two bouts on the show that have taken a late hit.
Heavyweight prospect Fabio Wardley (13-0, 12KOs) was fortunate to remain on the show after it was learned late in fight week that original opponent Kingsley Ibeh was unable to travel to London from the U.S. Wardley will now face Chris Healey (9-9, 2KOs) in a scheduled-eight round contest.
The main event is still intact, with Derek Chisora (32-12, 23KOs) and Kubrat Pulev (29-2, 14KOs) collide in a scheduled 12-round heavyweight bout more than six years after their May 2016 meeting which Pulev won via split decision.
Also on the show, unbeaten junior middleweight contender Israil Madrimov (8-0, 6KOs) faces veteran Michel Soro (35-3-1, 24KOs) in a rematch to their controversial title eliminator last December. Madrimov won the first fight via ninth-round stoppage, though the final sequence occurred well after the bell to end the round. The winner will become the WBA mandatory challenger for current undisputed junior middleweight champion Jermell Charlo (35-1-1, 19KOs).
Jake Donovan is a senior writer for krikya360.com. Twitter: @JakeNDaBox