By James Slater – Heavyweight powerhouse David Tua is set to return to action in New Zealand in March of next year, his promoter Cedric Kushner recently informed Newstalk ZB.
The 37-year-old, who was deemed lucky to have exited with a 12-round draw with New Yorker Monte “Two Gunz” Barrett back in July, was hoping to get back into the ring a lot sooner than next spring, but a nagging shoulder injury has delayed his plans. The news article reports how Tua only began punching in training this week.. Shortly after the unexpected draw with Barrett (in a fight that saw “The Tuaman” hit the canvas for the very first time in his pro career), Tua said the shoulder injury was something he carried into the July fight with him, and that this greatly affected his performance.
Now, though, when fully ready, the exciting slugger with the rock chin will get back in there and mix it with another name opponent. The March fight will see Tua face an as yet undisclosed foe, but Kushner says that the plan for after the tune-up is hopefully a clash with either Barrett in a rematch, former champ Hasim Rahman in what would be a third fight between the two or, perhaps most interestingly, a clash with former four-time king Evander Holyfield.
It’s not clear if either of these fights will be at all easy to make (the Barrett return aside; seeing as how it was assumed the two would definitely be having a return fight), but a Tua-Holyfield or a Tua-Rahman fight would be big business.
And it just might be that both “The Rock” and “The Real Deal” will be available to fight next March. It was reported yesterday how Rahman’s planned December bout with Frenchman Jean Marc Mormeck is now off (with “The Marksman” now set to face Timur Ibragimov on the Dec. 2nd date in Paris), while it’s been reported today how Holyfield’s on/of fight with Sherman Williams will not now be going ahead on its re-scheduled date of December 9th. Holyfield-Williams, already postponed more than once, may be re-scheduled yet again, for early next year, but the promoters aren’t hopeful.
So, it seems both Holyfield and Rahman are in need of a fight. Tua, of course, has met Rahman before – winning a 10th-round TKO in the first meeting and then boxing Rahman to a 12-round draw in the sequel – and a third fight between the two has been suggested for quite a while now. But Tua-Holyfield would be by far the bigger, more interesting fight. The two stars of the 1990s heavyweight division never met back in the day. Could they now do so in 2011?
Kushner certainly hopes so; and he also has Barrett and Rahman in mind as options for his warrior. There’s no word yet where Tua’s next fight after the March date will take place, but I think its safe to say Holyfield, Rahman or Barrett will want some decent money to agree to fight in New Zealand.