By Scott Gilfoid: Well, promoter Eddie Hearn of Matchroom Sport has done it. He’s put together a quick rematch between his fighter WBC Silver light heavyweight champion Tony Bellew (19-1-1, 12 KO’s) and challenger Isaac Chilemba (20-1-1, 9 KO’s) for May 25th on the undercard of the Carl Froch vs. Mikkel Kessler II rematch at the O2 Arena in London, UK.
The Bellew-Chilemba II fight will get third billing behind Froch-Kessler in the main event and George Groves vs. TBA as the co-feature. In a way that’s a good thing because it could be major buzz-kill for the British fans if Chilemba out-boxes Bellew for a second time and makes him look like a crude slugger again.
Bellew got what many boxing fans felt was a gift draw against Chilemba last March with the fight being scored 116-112 for Chilemba, 114-114 and 116-115 for Bellew. If Bellew gets another gift draw or a decision, it could be a real downer for the crowd before the main event between Froch and Kessler.
I think Hearn is making a mistake of putting Bellew back in with Chilemba so soon. I know he doesn’t have any choice but to try and get past Chilemba because this is supposed to be a WBC light heavyweight title eliminator, but Bellew needs more time to work on being less primitive and more of a boxer because he’s not going to beat Chilemba being thrown back into the ring with him so soon after the schooling he got last month.
We’ve already heard what Bellew’s plan is to try and beat Chilemba in the rematch with Bellew saying all he needs to do is keep his foot on the gas to outwork Chilemba. I can’t believe how flimsy this plan is because it’s not going to work.
The only thing that’s going to happen is Bellew will run out of gas even sooner than he did last time and end up getting clowned by Chilemba in the last four rounds of the fight.
Hearn said to thesun.co.uk “Bellew or Chilemba will fight the winner of [Chad] Dawson’s next fight against Adonis Stevenson on June 8, probably in September, but both men have to put in a better performance this time.”
Hearn needs to speak for his own fighter only because Chilemba did put in a good performance and he should have won the fight. I had Chilemba winning by the scores of 117-111, and I don’t see anything poor in his performance. He had Bellew swinging and missing like a drunk and it was superb performance from Chilemba; one of the best I’ve seen from a fighter.
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