by James Slater – We all knew there would be changes made to the ongoing “Super Six” tournament when it was announced that Denmark’s Mikkel Kessler – a tourney favourite as well as being the reigning WBC 168-pound champ – had been forced to withdraw due to an eye injury. And Dan Rafael over at ESPN.com has today revealed how the WBC has stripped “The Viking Warrior” of his title, making him the Champion Emeritus.
This means, that as soon as the roughly nine months of rest time he is expected to take is up, Kessler, upon his return to the ring, could make an immediate challenge for his old title. In the meantime, however, the WBC has said it will recognise the winner of the still-to-be-finalised Andre Ward-Andre Dirrell fight as the current super-middleweight champion. Also, to add further confusion, the WBC will make the upcoming October 2nd fight between Carl Froch and Arthur Abraham a final eliminator for the green belt..
Politics aside, what this means is we can look forward to some excellent WBC title fight match-ups. As soon as Ward (the reigning WBA 168-pound king) Vs. Dirrell (the WBC no.1 contender) is done, the winner will then have to clash with whoever it is who wins in Monaco next month – be it “Cobra” Froch or “King” Arthur. Then, when all the dust is settled from all that action, the ready-to-return Kessler will be waiting in the wings for whoever it is who is left standing!
The only problem, as Rafael reports, is when and where will the eagerly anticipated Ward-Dirrell fight actually take place? Showtime are reportedly pushing for the crucial fight to get done (original date Set. 25th, but highly unlikely now, seeing as neither fighter is in “heavy training”) but promoters Gary Shaw and Dan Goossen have both said they are pretty much in the dark about when and at what venue the bout will go ahead.
We knew there would be a good chance of problems cropping up when “Super Six” was first announced, and here we are. Still, the tournament has basically been a great event, and we still have the Ward/Dirrel/Froch/Abraham/Kessler rivalry to look forward to!