By Allan Fox: WBC heavyweight champion Vitali Klitschko (45-2, 41 KO’s) turns 42-years-old today on July 19th, and the big question is how much longer will he go before he finally makes his next title defense.
It’s been 10 months and yet he still doesn’t have an opponent picked out. You would have to imagine that if he were to pick an opponent out for his next defense it would still likely take him 2 or 3 months before he finally gets in the ring.
That means that a year would have gone by before Vitali had last defended his title. The World Boxing Council quickly gave former WBC super middleweight champion Andre Ward a status of “Champion in recess” four months after he won the title from Carl Froch after Ward injured his shoulder in training for another bout.
With Vitali not having fought in 10 months, it makes you wonder when the WBC will pull the trigger on Vitali to strip him of his title if he’s not going to defend anytime soon.
Vitali’s last defense came against #8 WBC, Manuel Charr last year in December. Vitali fought twice in 2012, but it’s like he’s not going to at all in 2013 unless he names an opponent sometime soon. There’s been talk that Vitali is trying to decide whether he wants to continue fighting or not.
If he’s not sure if he’s going to continue his career then he needs to get out of the way so that other fighters that are interested in his title can get a shot, because there are a lot of contenders ranked in the top 15 that want to get a shot at his WBC belt, but he’s holding onto it and not defending it this year for some reason.
There’s already a mandatory challenger in Bermane Stiverne who is waiting for his title shot for the WBC belt, and David Haye is more than interested in fighting Vitali for the WBC title as well once he gets past Tyson Fury in September.
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