By Luke Furman
Andrei Ryabińsky, who promotes Olympic gold medal winner Alexander Povetkin (30-1, 22 KOs), is going to do everything possible to secure his fighter the mandatory shot against WBC heavyweight champion Deontay Wilder (35-0, 34 KOs).
The World Boxing Council ordered the fight at their recent convention. They approved Wilder's request to have a third voluntary fight on January 16th at the Barclays Center in Brooklyn, New York.
Povetkin returned last and stopped Mariusz Wach in the twelfth round. No more interim-fights for Povetkin. His next stop is going to be Wilder.
"At the WBC convention, they allowed Wilder to fight in another voluntary defense of the title. Does this mean that we should also take another fight? I don't think so. I think the next opponent for Alexander will be Wilder. Judging by the behavior of the American's camp, I believe that they do not want this fight - but do not worry - we'll be waiting for them," Ryabinsky said.
"Let Wilder box, and we'll wait and then we'll proceed with the negotiations. It is 90% certain that the fight will take place in America. I think that that it's going to happen around the summer time."
Luke Furman covers boxing for bokser.org.