Tim Tszyu will brighten up the expectation with a fight – Kommersant

One of the most anticipated fights in professional boxing, in which two superstars should fight for the title of absolute world welterweight champion (up to 69.9 kg) – American Jermell Charlo, who owns it, and Tim Tszyu, son of the national boxing legend Konstantin Tszyu, representing Australia, still delayed due to a hand injury sustained by Charlo. Not hoping for his quick return to the ring, Tszyu decided to defend the title of interim champion of the World Boxing Organization (WBO) in a duel with a very strong Mexican fighter Carlos Ocampo.

Tim Tszyu, the owner of the interim World Boxing Organization welterweight title, has announced that he will fight his next fight on June 18 in Australia. His opponent in it will be the Mexican Carlos Ocampo. This is actually pretty bad news for most professional boxing fans. It means that the fight, which is included in the list of the most anticipated in this sport, has been postponed again for an indefinite period.

We are talking about a match with a special status already sanctioned last year by all organizations. It should be played for the title of the absolute world champion, who owns the belts of all four significant structures: the World Boxing Council (WBC), the World Boxing Association (WBA), the International Boxing Federation (IBF) and the WBO. They are currently owned by Jermell Charlo. The American enjoys enormous popularity, and in most of the most authoritative classifications of the strongest boxers in the world, regardless of the weight category – such as The Ring classification – is in the top ten.

The right to meet him was achieved by a superstar who had recently ascended. Tim Tszyu, who plays for Australia, is the son of, perhaps, the main legend of domestic boxing, Konstantin Tszyu, who in the 1990s was the absolute world champion in the category up to 63.5 kg.

Tszyu Jr. had already had an impressive professional career with 22 wins in 22 fights, and his fight against Charlo, first scheduled for late January, was destined to cause a huge buzz.

However, it has not yet grown together with him. The January fight between the American and the Australian was canceled after Jermell Charlo reported a severe hand injury he received during sparring. Tim Tszyu instead had to fight another American fighter – Tony Harrison – just for the title of interim WBO champion. Tszyu won the fight via knockout in the ninth round.

In March, Jermell Charlo, speaking about his treatment, said that due to the fracture of two bones in his arm, he was forced to wear a cast for about two months and still cannot strike at full strength. At the same time, he was nevertheless quite optimistic, adding that he plans to return to the ring for the sake of the fight with Timofey Tszyu in the summer. However, the latest news shows that the plans are not destined to come true and the process of Charlo’s recovery is being delayed.

Tszyu confirmed that none of the organizations required him to speak during this period. However, he decided to still hold an “intermediate” battle. And speaking about the choice of an opponent for him, the boxer said that he had always admired the “spectacular style” of the boxers from Mexico, and recalled the biography of his outstanding father, who fought five times against the Mexicans who once dominated the lighter-than-average weights and invariably took over them. Among these fights, the one that Konstantin Tszyu held in July 2000 stands out. In it, in six incomplete rounds, he dealt with the most apparently famous Mexican fighter in history at that time, Julio Cesar Chavez.

The reputation of Carlos Ocampo, of course, is no match for that of Chavez. In the BoxRec ranking of the best welterweights, for example, he is only in 15th position. However, you can’t call Ocampo a completely passable version either. In his track record, with 34 wins, there are only two defeats. He suffered one from Errol Spence, who is quoted about as high as Jermell Charlo, the second from Sebastian Fundora, who, like Tim Tszyu, had the title of interim champion, only according to the WBC.

Alexey Dospekhov