FOX Sports
Tszyu leans towards US
August 12, 2004
THE United States rather than Australia is leading the race to host
Kostya Tszyu’s long-awaited boxing world title bout against Sharmba
Mitchell in November.
Tszyu and his manager Matt Watt have spent almost a week in the United
States where they watched International Boxing Federation interim
light welterweight champion Mitchell defeat Moises Pedroza in a
non-title bout in Connecticut.
The 34-year-old Australian fighter resumes training in Sydney on
Sunday before heading to his customary two week pre-fight camp at the
Australian Institute of Sport on August 30.
Although Moscow was originally slated to host Russian-born Tszyu’s IBF
title defence against Mitchell last February it is out of the running
for the rescheduled November 6 bout.
“It’s going to be Australia or the United States, I’d have to say it’s
leaning towards the latter, but which city is not known,” Watt said
from Los Angeles.
“Kostya, the promoter and the television network will determine
between themselves as to where it will be,” added Watt, who expects a
decision to be made within a week.
He said New York’s famous Madison Square Garden was “extremely keen”
to stage the fight but there was a question mark over its availability
on the date locked in with American cable television network Showtime.
Meanwhile, Anthony Mundine has decided his September 8 rematch with
New Zealander Sean Sullivan will be staged at the EG Whitlam Centre in
Sydney.
While Mundine explored the possibility of fighting in Perth, his
manager Khoder Nasser said the fight would go ahead in Sydney because
of “logistics”, and “The Man” had decided against fighting at Burswood
Casino.
Australia’s next world title challenger, flyweight Vic Darchinyan will
head to the United States on Monday in preparation for his September 3
challenge to Columbia’s IBF world champion Irene Pacheco.
Armenian born Darchinyan has been sparring with three of his world
ranked stablemates, fellow flyweight Hussein Hussein, super
bantamweight Nedal Hussein and light welterweight Lovemore Ndou.
“The last couple of weeks Vic has been sensational, as good as anybody
I’ve ever worked with,” Darchinyan’s trainer Jeff Fenech said.
AAP
From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress