The World Boxing Super Series is set to hold their prestigious cruiserweight final event on May 11th in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia. But after Murat Gassiev’s victory over Yunier Dorticos on home soil in Sochi last weekend, the Russians now have other ideas.
Gassiev will face against Ukrainian Alexander Usyk in the final bout of the cruiserweight tournament. The scenario of two Russian speaking fighters in a unification fight that includes the WBA, WBO, WBC and IBF titles has sparked a massive boxing interest in Russia on a governmental level.
The Russian Federation of Boxing have plans to alter the original plans and host the final event in Moscow.
Umar Kremlov, General Secretary of the Russian Boxing Federation, says the plan is to send the Saudi’s an offer and see what happens after that. He has hopes of landing the big unification fight but it’s still too early to say whether they can actually get it done.
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“It’s still early to talk about it. We only started the negotiations. Everything depends on the Saudis. We are going make a concrete offer to them and then they will decide,” said Kremlov according to Sport-Express.
The fact that Saudi Arabia got involved in a boxing tournament that is hosted in Europe and the US shows that the Middle Eastern powerhouse is legitimately dedicated to hosting the final event and it won’t be easy nor cheap to buy it from them.
But Kremlov did reveal when the final decision will be made.
“It won’t as simple as just buying the final from them. They didn’t just casually book it, they are interested in it. Conclusively this issue will become clear in March,” the General Secretary concluded.
The WBO champion Usyk beat Marco Huck and Mairis Briedis to gain his spot in the final and won the WBC World cruiserweight title on the side from the Latvian Briedis.
Gassiev’s path to the final is equally as impressive. The Russian IBF World cruiserweight champion knocked out Krzysztof Wlodarczyk and won the WBA Super World cruiserweight via TKO against Dorticos.
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