Denzel Bentley wants a second crack at the WBO middleweight world boxing champion Janibek Alimkhanuly, vowing to knock the “cheat” out should they ever fight in a rematch.
Bentley was supposed to be a cannon-fodder for Janibek as Alimkhanuly boxed with his usual poise early—southpaw jab, straight left, neat control—but Bentley refused the script, flipped it, and made the champion fight during their 2022 battle at the Palms Casino Resort in Las Vegas.
The middle rounds got gritty. Janibek’s class won the first and last acts with Bentley’s pressure filling the middle. Cards went wide, but the story was closer than the scores suggested.
While Bentley rebounded with a knockout win in a British middleweight title defense, he went on to lose the belt by narrow, majority decision to Nathan Heaney in 2023. Bentley has won every fight since, and could be ready to test the world title waters once again.
But during his resurgence, there was a drug scandal involving Janibek, who was provisionally suspended after testing positive for a banned substance under VADA testing, a development that forced scrutiny on his title status and bouts.
Amid the aftermath, is Bentley, who said he’d relish the chance to fight Alimkhanuly again so he could drop and stop him in sweet revenge.
“As soon as this cheat is allowed to box I’m knocking him out,” he said recently on X, formerly Twitter, to suggest it’s a fight he’d chase next, over other options.
The comments come at a time in which Bentley lobbied for the WBO to elevate him as full world champion with Janibek suspended. Alimkhanuly quote-tweeted the situation, saying “he wants to take my title without a fight … he’s crying now and saying that everyone should support him. Why? Because he’s afraid to fight me.”
Bentley took umbrage with the narrative.
“He’s a fool,” he said. “He’s not allowed to box but he thinks I’m afraid to fight him lol.”
