Eastman Fights Tatevosyan!

20.01.04 – By Gav Macleod & Spud Woollatt: Due to Spanish Middleweight Jorge Sendra dropping out, World Class Middleweight Howard Eastman (38-1), will now fight Russian Middleweight Sergey Tatevosyan (20-3) on Friday 30th Jan. The location of the fight is The Goresbrook Leisure Centre, Dagenham in the heart of the East End of London. To give readers a chance to know a little bit about Tatevosyan, British Eastside’s reporter Gav Macleod has written the following…

Southpaw Sergey Tatevosyan has only been a professional since January 2000 but has been kept very active en route to amassing a 20-3 slate. The three defeats are not as bad as they might sound when you consider the opposition. In only his 6th contest Tatevosyan was matched with Liberian journeyman Lansana Diallo, a 35 fight veteran who simply had too much experience for the still rugged Russian who lost a very controversial SD12.

He started off 2002 with a bit of a whimper as he lost SD10 for the Russian Middleweight title to Aslanbek Kodzoev, but when you consider that Kodzoev is another Russian being tipped for the top then this is hardly a disgrace. The same applies to the final loss on Tatevosyan’s record which was a UD8 to the World Class Roman Karmazin, who was recently on these shores dismantling David Walker in defence of his European Light-Middleweight title.

After the Karmazin setback Tatevosyan has gone on the record 8 straight wins and last time out he defeated Yuri Tsarenko (known to us through his fights with Gary Lockett, Wayne Elcock and Ryan Rhodes) via a fairly comfortable 12 round decision.

The most impressive name on Tatevosyan’s list of victims is the former WBO Middleweight kingpin Armand Krajnc. The Swede was going great guns as a pro after he won the belt by knocking out England’s Jason Matthews in the eighth and serving Bert Schenk the same treatment only this time in the sixth. He was established in the worlds top ten at 160lbs but was to suffer his first defeat at the very talented hands of the unbeaten Harry Simon who won via UD12.

Krajnc looked to bounce back from this by taking on Tatevosyan but was later to regret the decision as the Russian pounded him into submission in the seventh round, a beating that was so severe that Krajnc spent time in hospital for a slight bleed on the brain. (Krajnc has since made a full recovery and is now fighting and winning again at 168lbs)

If there were still any doubts about Tatevosyan’s potential then we should also consider his fantastic amateur record which saw him win 155 out of 175 contests, and as we all know, you don’t compile numbers like that without having something special to offer.

This is a much better fight for Howard as Tatevosyan will present a MUCH harder assignment than Sendra would have. With Eastman on the verge of another no win situation by taking on Sendra (if he won early peole would of complained about the opponent and if he looked bad then people would have said he was overrated) promoter Mick Hennessy has done Howard a big favour as his man still waits for his shot at Bernard Hopkins.

It would have been easy for Hennessy to go and get an easy touch for the late notice job but they have set Howard up with a very good, and most importantly, a hungry fighter. Tatevosyan has a superb chin and carries a big punch in his southpaw left hand and as a result an Eastman win is hardly a formality.