Kovalev Baiting Adonis Once Again

By Olly Campbell - 05/13/2015 - Comments

After his recent ill-advised “racist” tweet ostensibly suggesting that 175lb rival and WBC champion Adonis Steven (26-1, 21ko) is a chimpanzee, unbeaten Russian banger Sergey Kovalev (27-0-1, 24ko) has gone on twitter once again to attempt to hype any potential clash – albeit in a slightly less offensive manner.

Two tweets from the “Krusher” in particular have been re-tweeted hundreds of times.

The first read;

“Stevenson let’s to (sic) fight for all four belts on HBO! Common (sic) Don’t scare! I not going to punch you hard. Be a real man!”

The 2nd, was slightly more succinct and complete with “chicken” emoticons. It read simply;

“Run Adonis! Run!”

It would seem to me that Sergey, who holds the WBO, WBA, IBF belts is wasting his time with lineal champion Stevenson, as since their mooted fight in early 2014 – of which Adonis pulled out of negotiations – the Haitian-Canadian signed with Al Haymon and now appears on Showtime.

Kovalev, who is promoted by the famous Main Events outfit – led by Kathy Duva – appears on broadcasting rival HBO.

In incredibly simplistic terms, this is what is keeping them apart.

When Kovalev became WBC mandatory after beating Jean Pascal back in March, purse bids for the clash were ordered. It is thought Al Haymons deep pockets would have won the bid and thus the fight would have gone to Stevenson’s Showtime broadcaster.

This caused Duva and Main Events to withdraw, citing they would not be able to take the fight on a rival network.

There remains a stalemate as it were. For the fans who want to see the best possible fights, it is irritating in the extreme – as no matter how much twitter baiting Kovalev does – it will be Al Haymon who has the ultimate say – and he really doesn’t like risking any of his golden eggs as we so often see.

For now, Kovalev will beat up mandatory challenger Nadjib Mohammedi (37-3, 23ko) on the 18th July and Stevenson is rumored to be meeting former Tony Bellew foe Isaac Chilemba (24-2-2, 10ko) later in the Summer in another – as yet unconfirmed – routine affair…

They’ll just have to hope the fans don’t lose interest. Which for a fight like this isn’t going to be likely!

Thanks for reading.

I’m on twitter @Undilutedpoison