Johnny Nelson has been ruled out of his WBO World Cruiserweight title defence against Enzo Maccarinelli on March 4 after injuring his knee in training. The British rivals were poised to fight it out at the M.E.N Arena as chief support to Joe Calzaghe's WBO/IBF World Super-Middleweight unification match up against Jeff Lacy. But Nelson spent the weekend in hospital after damaging knee ligaments during his preparations for the fight, and after taking medical advice, decided he had no option but to pull out.

"I am absolutely gutted. I was really up for this fight and had trained exceptionally hard for it until this injury occurred." said Nelson from his hospital bed. "No one is more disappointed than me and I can assure Enzo that he will be my next fight and also my incentive to get back to full fitness," Promoter Frank Warren added: "This is very disappointing news for everyone concerned. It was a fight boxing fans up and down the country were ! looking forward to, me included."

Maccarinelli will still appear on the Manchester show in a WBO Interim World title fight and he could be facing the man Nelson beat in his last defence, Vincenzo Cantatore.

The hard-hitting Italian - who put Nelson on the floor before losing on a split decision - has been approached by Sports Network about taking a fight against Maccarinelli and is being considered amongst a list of possible opponents.

Warren said, "We are looking at a number of world ranked opponents for Enzo, including Cantatore, and I'm hoping we can announce a replacement within the next couple of days."

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