Boxing

The weekend brings four major main events and some entertaining undercard bouts from California to Texas to Japan. Middleweight champion Gennadiy Golovkin faces fellow champion Ryota Murata in a highly anticipated fight in Saitama, Japan. A GGG victory will put him in position to face Canelo Alvarez in a trilogy fight, this time at super

Mar 27, 2022 Mike CoppingerESPN George Kambosos and Devin Haney have struck a deal for a June 5 fight for the undisputed lightweight championship at Marvel Stadium in Melbourne, Australia, Top Rank announced on Thursday. The bout will take place Sunday afternoon in Australia to accommodate a June 4 prime-time broadcast in the United States

4:12 PM ET Mike CoppingerESPN Janibek Alimkhanuly and Danny Dignum will meet for the WBO’s interim middleweight title on May 21, sources tell ESPN. No location has been finalized for the Top Rank Boxing on ESPN main event, but the bout will take place in the U.S. Former 130-pound titleholder Jamel Herring, who lost his

11:54 AM ET Mike CoppingerESPN Naoye Inoue and Nonito Donaire are set to meet again in a rematch of ESPN’s 2019 Fight of the Year. Inoue, ESPN’s No. 3 pound-for-pound boxer, announced on social media that he’s set to fight Donaire on June 7 (a Tuesday) at Saitama Super Arena in Saitama, Japan. Inoue will

9:31 AM ET World heavyweight champion Oleksandr Usyk’s rematch with Anthony Joshua is likely to take place in June with Saudi Arabia among the venues being considered, his promoter told Sky Sports. Usyk beat Joshua in front of a sell-out crowd at the Tottenham Hotspur Stadium in September to seize the WBA, WBO, IBF and

8:07 AM ET Mike Coppinger Nick Parkinson Close •Reports on boxing for ESPN.co.uk, as well as several national newspapers•Has been reporting on British boxing for over 15 years•Appears on BoxNation’s Boxing Matters show After a slow start to the year, the boxing schedule heats up starting next month. April 9 really kicks the action off

8:03 PM ET Nick Parkinson Close •Reports on boxing for ESPN.co.uk, as well as several national newspapers•Has been reporting on British boxing for over 15 years•Appears on BoxNation’s Boxing Matters show Josh Warrington turned around his career with a spiteful seventh round win over Kiko Martinez to reclaim the IBF world featherweight title Saturday. Warrington

2:11 PM ET Mike CoppingerESPN George Kambosos and Devin Haney have struck a deal for a June 5 fight for the undisputed lightweight championship at Marvel Stadium in Melbourne, Australia, sources tell ESPN. The bout will take place Sunday afternoon in Australia to accommodate a June 4 prime-time broadcast in the United States on ESPN,

12:14 AM ET Australian boxing star Tim Tszyu has announced his arrival on the international stage with a unanimous points decision over Terrell Gausha in his much-anticipated US debut in Minneapolis. Tszyu was dropped in the opening round before recovering to win over the trio of American judges and claim a brave victory in his

12:11 AM ET Mike CoppingerESPN Miguel Berchelt was brutally knocked out by Oscar Valdez in February 2021, and it’s now apparent he lost much more than just his 130-pound title that night. In his 135-pound debut, Berchelt was stopped in Round 6 by Namibia’s Jeremia Nakathila on Saturday in Las Vegas in an early contender

5:09 PM ET Mike CoppingerESPN Teofimo Lopez is eyeing a June or July return after undergoing arthroscopic surgery on his right hand Thursday in Los Angeles, the boxer’s manager, David McWater, told ESPN. Lopez, 24, also had arthroscopic surgery on his left elbow in February in L.A., McWater said. The hand surgery lasted about two

9:00 AM ET Nick Parkinson Close •Reports on boxing for ESPN.co.uk, as well as several national newspapers•Has been reporting on British boxing for over 15 years•Appears on BoxNation’s Boxing Matters show Josh Warrington is confident he can emulate Saturday’s opponent Kiko Martinez’s reversal of fortune and turn his career around to become a two-time world

11:02 PM ET Thriving under the pressure of his all-or-nothing US debut, Tim Tszyu is vowing to “take over” boxing’s super-welterweight division and become a unified world champion. “It’s in my heart, in my destiny. I’m not here to just take part; I’m here to really take over and I believe it,” Tszyu said after

5:42 PM ET Mike CoppingerESPN Terence Crawford is looking to become undisputed in a third weight class, but he’s not limiting himself to welterweight. The 34-year-old became a promotional free agent after his long-term contract with Top Rank expired in November, eliminating one major roadblock to his pursuit of Errol Spence Jr., who holds two

8:00 AM ET ESPN staff Sonny Bill Williams has blasted Barry Hall out inside two minutes and says Paul Gallen could be his next opponent. New Zealand’s dual code rugby star Williams demolished AFL great in Sydney on Wednesday night, dominating from the opening seconds. Williams jolted the Sydney Swans premiership winner in the first

7:45 AM ET Timothy Bradley Jr. There are 17 weight divisions in men’s boxing, and in each one there is a champion determined by each of the four major sanctioning bodies: the WBC, WBA, WBO and IBF. Some of these organizations also have a secondary titlist or an interim titlist, and all four have rankings

6:05 PM ET Mike CoppingerESPN Oleksandr Usyk and Anthony Joshua are going to run it back this summer. Usyk received permission to leave Ukraine from the country’s sports minister and will begin training camp for the heavyweight title rematch this summer after crossing the border to Poland, sources told ESPN. The unified champion joined a

9:55 AM ET ESPN Africa Boxing 15 will be headlined by a fight for the IBF Africa female Jr. Welterweight belt, between South Africa’s Hedda Wolmarans and Malawi’s Ruth Chisale March 24. The main event is a bout that sees Chisale, a Malawian soldier given special leave by her commanding officer for the event, looking