By Sean McDaniel: Earlier tonight, WBA World heavyweight champion Alexander Povetkin (25-0, 17 KO’s) took care of business in destroying Hasim Rahman (50-8-2, 41 KO’s) in a 2nd round TKO in Hamburg, Germany in one of Povetkin’s most easiest fights since stopping Patrice L’Heureux in the 2nd round in 2007. The with the horrible mismatch between Povetkin and Rahman now out of the way, the question on the minds of many boxing fans is who will Povetkin be fighting next.

Sports Illustrated is reporting that Povetkin’s manager Chris Meyer is saying that the WBA will be calling for a mandatory fight between WBA Super World heavyweight champion Wladimir Klitschko and Povetkin, the WBA World heavyweight champion, by February 27th of next year. However, Wladimir doubts that Povetkin really wants to fight him, telling Sports Illustrated writer Chris Mannix “Right. Where was he before? Please.”

Povetkin has the chance to fight Wladimir on a couple of occasions but opted not to take the fight with him.

Wladimir’s manager Bernd Boente said to Sports Illustrated that Wladimir doesn’t have a mandatory title defense for his World Boxing Association title due up until next summer. As such, it doesn’t look like Wladimir and Povetkin will be meeting up anytime soon, which is probably a good thing for Povetkin because he doesn’t match up well with Wladmir at all.

Povetkin can knockout an old and way past his best Rahman but it’s a whole different story in trying to do the same thing against someone that can punch back with power, speed and who use the ring unlike Rahman. Povetkin is much better off continuing to defend his WBA title against the weak opposition that the WBA have ranked. They really did Povetkin a huge favor by making Rahman his #1 mandatory challenger. It was the equivalent of taking a 2nd tier fighter and putting him at the top spot. Not a smart move by the WBA, and why they it is anyone’s guess.