Manuel Charr vs. James Toney on December 20th in Hamburg, Germany

By Boxing News - 12/03/2013 - Comments

charr43By Eric Thomas: Former three division world champion James Toney (76-9-3, 46 KO’s) will be facing #6 WBC Manuel Charr (25-1, 15 KO’s) next month on December 20th in a 12 round bout at the Messem Schnelsen, in Hamburg, Germany.

Charr is aiming low with this fight by taking on the 45-year-old Toney, but it’s been the norm for Charr to pad his record against less than dangerous opposition throughout his career. The 29-year-old Charr fought for a world title last year in losing by a 4th round TKO to WBC heavyweight champion Vitali Klitschko in September of 2012.

Charr was picked out by Vitali as an optional title defense. It’s highly unlikely that Charr would have ever been able to beat the likes of Bermane Stiverne or Chris Arreola to become Vitali’s mandatory challenger, so Vitali picked him out as an optional title defense. What made Charr appealing to Vitali, besides his less impressive skills, was him being well known to the German fans.

Charr didn’t look like he belonged in the same ring with the then 41-year-old Vitali. The bout was finally stopped to due a bad cut Charr suffered on his right eyebrow. Charr was knocked down in the 2nd round by Vitali, and he was heading for a bad knockout when the cut saved Charr from having to experience that end.

The World Boxing Council has surprisingly pushed Charr up in the rankings to the #6 spot from where he was previously at #8 at the time Vitali beat him. Since his loss to Vitali, Charr has beaten Konstantin Airich, Yakup Saglam, Oleksiy Mazkin and Denis Bakhtov.

Toney is at the point in his career where he’s getting beaten routinely. He took part in Matchroom Sport’s Prizefighter tournament last month and was beaten by Jason Gavern by a 3 round decision to be eliminated from the tourney. Earlier this year, Toney lost a one-sided 12 round unanimous to Australian heavyweight Lucas “Big Daddy” Browne in April in Australia. Last year, Toney beat Bobby Gunn by a 5th round stoppage.

A prime Toney would make Charr look bad, but it’s been years since Toney was in his prime and he’s now someone that is just boxing for the love of the sport.



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