All the terms have been agreed, signed, sealed and delivered, and Vasyl Lomachenko and Guillermo Rigondeaux will meet on December 9 at Madison Square Garden in New York, in a great fight that will go out live on ESPN.
This news has been conformed by multiple sources including Yahoo! Sports & Lance Pugmire. Lomachenko, a pound-for-pound star and the reigning WBO super-featherweight champion, will defend his belt against Rigondeaux, a pound-for-pound star and a reigning super-bantamweight champion. Together the two incredibly gifted southpaws will make boxing history as the first-ever duel Olympic gold medal winners to fight one another at pro level.
Arguably two of the finest amateur boxers of all-time – Lomachenko achieving an incredible 396-1 record at amateur level, Rigondeaux getting to 463-12 – the Ukrainian and the Cuban will very likely give boxing purists the Fight of The Year. It’s great news that this excellent match-up has been made, and fans who are so looking forward to tomorrow night’s big, no, massive middleweight collision between Gennady Golovkin and Canelo Alvarez now have something else to look forward to.
Rigondeaux, unbeaten at 17-0(11) has wanted a shot at Lomachenko, 9-1(7) for the longest time, but Todd duBoef of Top Rank says “Hi-Tech,” as Lomachenko is known, also wanted the fight:
“Lomachenko really wanted the fight,” duBoef said. “He has a voracious appetite to fight the best, and to fight the guys who people think are the most difficult fighters. He likes to challenge himself and this is a fight he has talked to us about for a while.”
Meanwhile, Bob Arum says he is looking especially forward to this fight as it is historic, or, as Arum puts it, a “legacy fight.”
“I’m not saying I’m so happy to to do this thing because it’s going to be the greatest fight since Ali-Frazier III. What intrigues me is that this is a legacy fight,” Arum said. “It’s kind of like having done the last fight in old Yankee Stadium, Ali-Norton and then the first one in the new Yankee Stadium with Cotto-[Yuri] Foreman. That’s a landmark and those are historic things to have under your belt.”
History and legacies aside, Lomachenko-Rigondeaux is a potentially super boxing match. As Arum says, this one will not bring back memories of the sheer violence of “The Thrilla in Manila,” but in terms of skill, of boxing intellect, this match-up is arguably the finest, most fascinating of the year.
Can Rigondeaux cope with the added weight he will have to put on to fight Lomachenko? Can Lomachenko cope with Rigondeaux’ incredible skill and cunning? Who will win? Let the debate begin now that the fight is official!