The WBA World Championship Committee has stripped it's Regular heavyweight champion Ruslan Chagaev of its title. Chagaev was handed back the title that he appeared to lose by knockout in March to Lucas Browne, but when Browne failed a drug test Chagaev was reinstalled as beltholder.. Unfortunately Ruslan took too long in finalising a mandated defence (rematch) with Fres Oquendo, the governing bodies number one challenger, so relinquishing his claim on the title. The exact details as to why the negotiations failed are vague, yet the finer points did included Chagaev catching up on WBA past-due sanctioning fees.
The WBA's plans of a heavyweight tournament to establish a single champion now look a little sketchy, If the scheduled placements in the tourney plan remain as they are, the 43-year-old Oquendo would now make the final sometime in mid 2017, possibly without any actual ring action in any of its rounds.
The other half of the draw should feature WBA interim champion Cubas Luis Ortiz against Minsk's Alexander Ustinov on September 17th, however this pairing is too suffering its setbacks, both camps failing to tie up the red tape thus far, leaving yet another portion of the tournament hanging in the balance.. Finally the rematch between WBA Super champion Tyson Fury and Wladimir Klitschko is set to go ahead on October 29th, a rescheduled date following Tyson Fury's recent ankle injury. The bout will still take place at the Manchester arena, the winner in theory would ascend through the tourney to meet the Ortiz-Ustinov winner, should both fights proceed according to plan... Victorious fighters would then hold the right to face Oquendo in the final..
In the event that Ustinov falls out of the Ortiz match, replacing him with Oquendo would seem the logical solution, in which case the tournament could be moved along as proposed.. All is never as simple as first anticipated..
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