WBA and IBO World Light Heavyweight champion Dmitriy Bivol is scheduled this Saturday to defend his titles against WBA Continental champion unbeaten Malik Zinad 22-0 with 16 stoppages.
It will take place at the Kingdom Arena, Riyadh, Saudi Arabia over DAZN PPV. This will be Bivol’s eleventh title defense. He is the former WBA Interim champion.
Bivol has never fought anyone with a losing record in his twenty-two fights. He was scheduled to meet Russian Artur Beterviev, 20-0 with 20 stoppages, fighting out of Montreal, Canada, who holds the WBC, WBO, and IBF World Light Heavyweight titles in a unification bout when the latter pulled out due to an injury.
As an amateur, Bivol was 268-15. In 2022, he was voted Ring Magazine and Boxing Writers Association’s Fighter of the Year for his two victories.
He defeated World Unified Super Middleweight champion Saul ‘Canelo’ Alvarez, then 57-1-2, and then unbeaten NABF champion Gilberto ‘Zurdo’ Ramirez, then 44-0. In his lone bout in 2023, he defeated IBO World champ Lyndon ‘King’ Arthur, 23-1, in December.
Since Bivol’s winning the WBA title and his defenses along with their records at the time were against Trent Broadhurst, 20-1; Sullivan Barrera, 29-1-1; Isaac ‘Golden Boy’ Chilemba, 25-2-2; for WBA and WBC world champion Jean Pascal, 33-5-1; former WBO champion Joe Smith, Jr. 24-2; Gilberto Costello Rivera, 20-2-1; Craig ‘Spider’ Richards, 16-1-1; Umar Salamov, 26-1.
Bivol’s record is 22-0 with 11 stoppages. Perhaps his low stoppage record is why he is not compared to current welterweight and two-division world champion Terence ’Bud’ Crawford, 40-0 with 31 stoppages from the USA and four division and current champion WBA, WBO, WBC, and IBF Super Bantamweight champion Naoya ‘Monster’ Inoue, 27-0 with 24 stoppages from Japan mostly regarded as the two best pound for pound champions in the world.
It may take a win over Beterbiev to elevate him to that position. What do you boxing fans think?
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