15.01.07 – By Per Ake Persson: British jr welter Ted Bami has pulled ouf of the EBU titlefight against Gianluca Branco due to a shoulder injury. Bami vs Branco was scheduled for Milano January 25. The show will still go ahead with EBU jr middle titleholder Michele Piccirillo taking on Michael Jones. OPI 2000 is still working on the undercard but Arena Box Promotion have as already reported two guys on the show; heavyweight Steffen Kretschmann and jr welter Aydin Selcuk..
German heavy Luan Krasniqi headlines a Universum show March 17 in Stuttgart writes German news agency dpa. Opponent might be ex-WBO heavy champ Lamon Brewster, who stopped Krasniqi back 2005, Tony Thompson, Hasim Rahman or perhaps even Evander Holyfield. The 35-year old Krasniqi, 29-2-1, fought just once last year, partly due to an injury and partly due to managerial dispute.
WIBF fly champ Regina Halmich had seven million fans watching on ZDF as she outscored Reka Kempf in a rather drab fight boxingwise. Thomas Ulrich´s exciting tko win over Rachid Kanfouah had slightly over three million watching – and it wasn´t even televised live.
Belgians Cedric Charlier and Douglas Bellini clash for the vacant TWBA middleweight title February 24 in Herstal.
Norwegian superbantam Reidar Walstad square off against Frenchman Jean Marie Codet January 30 in Helsinki on the Asikainen vs Di Giacomo bill. Latvian jr middle Jurijs Boreiko is off the show as he will participate in a K 1 event a few days later, also in Finland.
UK-based Albanian Quato Kreshnik and Russian veteran Alexander Zaitsev are to fight for the vacant EEEU supermiddle title March 3 in Tirana, the capital of Albania.
Frenchman Cyril Thomas have relinquished the EBU featherweight title. Dane Spend Abazi and Ukrainian Yuri Voronin are co-challengers for the vacant title with January 30 as deadline for agreement or pursebids. Abazi is of course still in line to fight Robert Guerrero for the vacant IBF title but when and where are is still open.