Tony Bellew Steps in to Face Cleverly Saturday Night… Then Fails to Make Weight
Tony “The Bomber” Bellew has stepped in and agreed to face Nathan Cleverly Saturday night in the main event of a card that was supposed to feature Cleverly battling titlist Juergen Braehmer. Braehmer pulled out of the fight, marking the third straight fight in a year that he has withdrawn from, and Bellew jumped right in. The two undefeated U.K. light heavyweights, old rivals in the British and U.K. boxing scene, don’t mince their feelings about one another, and the press conference for the bout got quite heated.
Bellew came right into the press conference and started hurling insults and talking trash, livening up the scene quite a bit. Cleverly told him he’d give him a free shot, and Bellew seemed to want to oblige him with that right on the spot. So Cleverly vs. Bellew will produce a second nice rivalry match on the card, adding to the James DeGale vs. George Groves battle.
[Read our previous exclusive interview with Tony “The Bomber” Bellew.]
Bellew took the fight on just a few days notice, and had between 6-7 lbs to lose before the bout Saturday night. That means that in addition to the very intriguing press conference, the weigh-in might be interesting viewing as well. If the two fighters go after one another as hard as they promised, then the fight should be excellent too.
Bellew is 15-0 with 10 knockouts to his ledger; Cleverly is 21-0 with 10 KOs, and had been the interim WBO light heavyweight titlist. With Braehmer’s withdrawal, this bout will be for the full WBO title.
UPDATE:
As we highlighted earlier, Tony Bellew’s weight was a concern with just two days notice before the fight. Today at the weigh-in, Bellew was unable to make the light heavyweight limit, and he has been pulled from the bout.
Now Nathan Cleverly is facing a new foe… Aleksy Kuziemski. The Polish boxer, Cleverly’s third listed opponent on the bout sheet in the last three days, is 21-2 with just 5 KOs on his resume. While not having met many notable names, he actually did face Juergen Braehmer in August of 2009, losing by 11th round TKO.
Given the short notice for accepting this fight, Cleverly will surely be looking to outdo his one-time foe in Braehmer and put on a better show against Kuziemski. Still, with two last-minute opponent changes, Cleverly has to be a bit drained right now mentally, and will just need to focus on going about his business and using his own skills as opposed to developing a pre-fight game plan.
