Despite many feeling young and unbeaten Anthony Yarde may not be ready for a fight with WBO light heavyweight Sergey Kovalev, it looks like that fight may be well on its way.
The WBO recently ordered the contest, giving the parties 30 days to negotiate a deal. If no deal can be reached, then a purse bid will have to take place.
As we all saw in his last contest, Kovalev (33-3-1, 28 KO) regained the WBO title with a unanimous decision win over Eleider Alvarez in their rematch of February 2nd in Texas. Prior to that fight, Kovalev has suffered a horrific knockout loss at the hands of Alvarez this past August. He was dropped three times in that contest in the seventh round and many felt he would lose the rematch as well.
But with new trainer James “Buddy” McGirt guiding him and getting him back to basics, Kovalev, now 35 years old, looked solid in clearly out boxing Alvarez, and he has expressed interest in unification showdowns with fellow champions Oleksandr Gvozdyk (WBC) , Dmitry Bivol (WBA), and Artur Beterbiev (IBF).
Each of those contests would make for must-see TV in some way or another. Gvozdyk showed his mettle in stopping Adonis Stevenson in December, and he is finally coming into his own. Bivol has been a champion for well over a year and has shown flashes of athleticism and explosiveness. And Beterbiev is a huge punches whom Kovalev has already traded words with online.
But first Kovalev must get past the challenge of Yard, 27.
Yarde (18-0, 17 KO) is in an awkward prediction if you really look at this matchup closely. Through his first four years as a professional he certainly has dominated and shown his power, but he hasn’t really faced the level of competition that you would want from a prospect heading into a title fight vs. a dangerous foe.
Yard is coming off of a victory over 38-year-old American Travis Reeves on March 8 at Royal Albert Hall, and a look up and down his resume leaves much to be desired to be honest. Perhaps he and his team know something that we don’t, but on the surface this looks like someone who may be biting off more than they can chew.
Kovalev had a pair of losses to Andre Ward in November of 2016 and June of 2017 that left his career in limbo. He bounced back to capture the WBO title, only to lose it to Alvarez. The fact that he was able to bounce back and defeat Alvarez speaks on his re-commitment to the sport, but who knows much those losses have taken from him. This will a matchup of experience vs. youth and will tell us all we need to know about Yarde.
If terms of the fight can’t be agreed to, then the fight will go to purse bid, with a minimum amount of $300,000 being set. But this is a contest that should be easy to make, as both Frank Warren, who promotes Yarde, and Main Events, who handle Kovalev, have a working relationship with Top Rank. At the present time, Top Rank has an exclusive output deal with ESPN, so expect the fight to land on that network or their ESPN + streaming app.
