By Charles Brun: Negotiations are underway for WBO light heavyweight champion Sergey Kovalev to defend his title against mandatory challenger Anthony Yarde (18-0, 17 KOs) on June 29 in Russia on ESPN, according to Mike Coppinger. The Kovalev-Yarde fight finally has a set date. Now it just needs to be official along with the venue in Russia.
Kovalev vs. Yarden will be taking place on the same day as the June 29th fight between WBO middleweight champion Demetrius Andrade and Maciej Sulecki on DAZN. However, that fight will be taking place later in the evening on the 29th, so it won’t conflict with the Kovalev-Yarde fight.
There are some boxing fans that think that Yarde will find a way to get out of the fight at the last minute. That would be a weak move on Yarde’s part if he had second thoughts about taking this fight. The thing is, if Yarde suffers an injury in training and pulls out of the fight, the fans are going to suspect that he’s ducked the fight even if the injury were legit.
This is a tremendous step up in class for the 27-year-old Yarde in taking on a fighter with the kind of top level experience that Kovalev possesses. Yarde’s best fights thus far have come against these guys: Walter Gabriel Sequeira, Travis Reeves, Dariusz Sek, Tony Averlant, Nikola Sjekloca, Norbert Nemesapati and Richard Baranyi. Those are fighters that are more second tier level guys, and not true world class guys. It would have been better if Yarde’s management let him get some more experience before they had him fight for a world title against Kovalev.
What led to Yarde earning the #1 ranking with the World Boxing Organization was him beating Richard Baranyi to win the WBO European title, and then defeating Nemesapati to capture the vacant WBO Inter-Continental Light Heavyweight Title. Those two WBO trinket titles were stepping stones for Yarde to be vaulted into the #1 position with the WBO at the world level at 175.
Yarde’s management knew what they were doing in building him up to a #1 ranking with the WBO. However, moving Yarde easily to the #1 ranking with the sanctioning without having him fight anyone remotely talented along the way did him no favors, because he doesn’t have the experience that he needs to compete with guys like Kovalev and the other top fighters in the division. Yarde will get a nice payday in challenging Kovalev, but he’s likely to lose badly unless the 35-year-old Russian fighter gets old overnight.
This will be Kovalev’s first defense of his WBO title that he re-captured last February in defeating Eleider Alvarez by a 12 round unanimous decision on ESPN in Frisco, Texas.
Coppinger said this on his Twitter:
”SOURCES: Deal is close to pit Sergey Kovalev against mandatory challenger Anthony Yarde on June 29 in Russia on an ESPN platform. Will be Kovalev’s first defense since he beat Eleider Alvarez in a February rematch. Yarde’s first crack at a title.”