Team Sauerland seek quick title fight for Valuev following Chagaev´s latest withdrawal

Following Universum boxer Ruslan Chagaev’s latest withdrawal from the heavyweight championship, Team Sauerland are now seeking a title fight for Nikolai Valuev, the mandatory challenger, against a different opponent in the near future. Such a request has already been lodged with the World Boxing Association (WBA) by Sauerland managing director Chris Meyer..

“First of all we would personally like to wish Ruslan Chagaev all the best and a quick recovery,” said Meyer in Berlin today. “Since the extent of the injury rules Chagaev out of boxing for at least six months, we assume the WBA will order a world title fight for Valuev against another opponent.”

According to a press release from Chagaev’s Universum promoters yesterday, Chagaev had torn his Achilles tendon and been forced to pull out of his mandatory defence scheduled for July 5. It was the second time he had withdrawn in a short space of time. The first fight in May was cancelled due to a viral infection for Chagaev. “We are obviously disappointed,” added the Sauerlandmanaging director. “Valuev has now been waiting over 14 months for his revenge and has had to go through a complete preparation twice.”

Chagaev clinched the WBA title on a narrow points decision against the Russian Giant in April 2007. According to the rules, a mandatory defence must take place within a year. With this latest withdrawal, Chagaev has now overrun this period by more than two months. “If we were to await
Chagav´s recovery, two years would pass before his first mandatory title defence. For us, that is clearly an unacceptably long period of time,” added Meyer. “Furthermore there have been press reports claiming Chagaev has further health problems so we cannot really predict when he will actually fight again. Therefore, we have put in a request to the WBA for Nikolai to be able to fight for the vacant world title in the very near future.”

Bild newspaper reported in May that Uzbek Chagaev, according to his ex-manager Taymas Niyazov, was suffering from a retinal detachment in his left eye which had led to a short-sightedness of seven diopters. Universum had denied these claims. “Independent of Chagaev’s eye sight, we certainly want an officially appointed doctor of the WBA to check his latest injury,” said Chris Meyer. “We expect our request will be accepted and Nikolai will soon be able to fight for the title”