IBF/WBC light heavyweight champion Artur Beterbiev will be defending against his IBF mandatory Fanlong Meng (16-0, 10 KOs) a month from now on September 25 on ESPN in Ekaterinburg, Russia.
Beterbiev and Meng are both coming off of a long period of inactivity, with each of them having been out of the ring since October of last year.
This is the second time the 2012 Olympian Beterbiev (15-0, 15 KOs) will be trying to satisfy his mandatory requirements with the International Boxing Federation.
Artur needs to get Meng out of the way
Beterbiev, 34, and Meng were planning on fighting on March 28 at the Videotron Centre in Quebec City, Canada, but the contest was later canceled in response to the COVID 19 pandemic.
If Beterbiev can get this fight out of the way against Meng in September without it being canceled again, then he can move on and look to battle WBA light heavyweight champion Dmitry Bivol.
The fights are ahead of Beterbiev, and he needs to satisfy his IBF mandatory against Meng to move on to bigger and better things.
Unfortunately for Beterbiev, there aren’t a lot of great match-ups for him in the 175lb division right now. Sergey Kovalev is well past his prime at 36 and coming off of a knockout loss to Canelo Alvarez.
Other than Bivol, there aren’t any great opponents for Beterbiev to fight that would attract a lot of interest from the boxing world. Ideally, it would be great if Canelo or someone like Callum Smith came up to 175 to challenge Beterbiev for his IBF and WBC titles, but that’s not likely.
If Canelo wanted any part of fighting Beterbiev, he would have held onto his WBO light heavyweight title after his win over Kovalev last November instead of vacating it quietly.
Ring rust is less of a factor for a massive puncher like Beterbiev, however, as he only needs to worry about getting near enough to te 32-year-old Meng to hit him with his powerful shots.
The highly Meng is highly skilled, and he’s excellent at using the ring to keep his opponents from landing their shots. Beterbiev is going to need to use his legs to cut off the ring if he wants to get to the crafty Chinese fighter.
Meng is not going to stand in front of Beterbiev like his last opponent, former WBC 175-lb champion Oleksandr Gvozdyk did last October in Philadelphia.
Gvozdyk gave Beterbiev something to think about in the first six rounds with his highly accurate combination punching and big power shots. But by the second half of the fight, Beterbiev took over the contest with his bombs aimed at Gvozdyk’s body. Those punches took the air out of the Ukrainian’s game, and he wore down steadily from that point on.
Meng defeated Deines to earn IBF mandatory spot
There’s not a lot known about Meng aside from his 16-pro fight record being littered with 2nd tier fighters that aren’t world-class.
Meng has yet to have a real test against a top-five contender, and the IBF made it easy for him to earn the mandatory spot by sanctioning his fight against Adam Deines as a title eliminator last year in June 2019.
Deines is the only top tier guy that Meng has fought during his five-year career, and he’s not a great fighter.
Meng’s other notable wins have come against Frank Buglioni and Daniel Judah. Those two are second-tier level light heavyweights and not world-class.
Beterbiev is making his fourth defense of his IBF belt against Meng. In the last three years, Beterbiev has beaten Radivoje Kalajdzic, Gvozdyk, Callum Johnson, and Enrico Koelling.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1-aQPx2l48k&t=8s
If Beterbiev wins this fight against Meng, he has several options available for his next contest. It’ll be up to his management which way they want to with him, but these some appealing potential fights:
- Dmitry Bivol
- Jean Pascal
- Gilberto Ramirez
- Marcus Browne
- Joshua Buatsi
- Joe Smith Jr
- Badou Jack
- Anthony Yarde
- Eleider Alvarez
- Sergey Kovalev