Artur Beterbiev vs. Ezequiel Maderna this Saturday on ESPN

By Boxing News - 05/30/2016 - Comments

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By Allan Fox: Unbeaten light heavyweight contender Artur Beterbiev (9-0, 9 KOs) will be returning to the ring in a tough tune-up bout against Argentinian Ezequiel Maderna (23-2, 15 KOs) this Saturday night on June 4th on ESPN Boxing from the Bell Center in Montreal, Canada.

Beterbiev has been out of action with injuries for the past year. Beterbiev, 31, has a lot of lost time to make up for. He’s expected to take a couple of tune-up fights before looking to fight for a world title in 2017.

He can’t fight for a world title belt this year against IBF/WBA/WBO light heavyweight champion Sergey Kovalev is already booked up with fights against Isaac Chilemba in July and a title defense against Andre Ward in November if the two fighters win their next fights.

Beterbiev did well against Kovalev in the amateur ranks in beating him. Kovalev has improved since turning pro, and it’s unknown now Beterbiev would do against him now. Beterbiev needs to get the rust out of his system before he starts thinking about fighting guys like Kovalev. Beterbiev already had a late start in turning pro by moving into the pro ranks in his late 20s.

Beterbiev beat Alexander Johnson by a 7th round knockout last year in June. That was probably the toughest fight of Beterbiev’s three-year pro career, as he had to deal with a lot of movement and pot shots from Johnson. It was a different style that Beterbiev had been fighting against previously, so he had to cut off the ring to force Johnson to fight him. It wasn’t easy.

The good news for Beterbiev is that the 29-year-old Maderna isn’t a highly mobile fighter. He’s someone that will be standing in front of Beterbiev looking to punch with him. That’s the perfect style match-up. Maderna has been a pro for the past eight years since 2008. He has losses to Edwin Rodriguez and Thomas Oosthuizen. Both of those defeats were decision losses. Maderna has never been knocked out in his career.

It’s going to be tough for Beterbiev to KO him. If Rodriguez couldn’t do it, then the chances are fairly good that Beterbiev won’t be able to get him out of there too. Rodriguez is a pretty knockout with a 63% KO ratio. Maderna was knocked down in the 8th, but Rodriguez couldn’t keep him down. Maderna’s loss to Oosthuizen was a close 10 round majority decision. It was a competitive fight.

Beterbiev has knockout wins over Tavoris Cloud and Gabriel Campillo. Those are guys that were very good fighters in their primes. By the time Beterbiev fought them, they were getting up there in age and weren’t the same fighters they’d been in the past.