Boxing News Boxing News
While no fighter should look past their next fight, the path to glory already appears to be set out for Kazak punching machine Zhanat Zhakiyanov.
The 30-year-old will attempt to win the vacant WBC EPBC Bantamweight crown against undefeated Georgian Gagi Edisherashvili in Minsk, Belarus tonight and victory will set up a defence against former Commonwealth title challenger Fred Mundraby on November 12.
Should Zhakiyanov win that fight, he will then be very close to a world title shot. Currently he is ranked number two by the WBC and also features in the top ten ratings of the IBF, WBA and WBO so a number of big fights lay ahead.
“My trainer and hero, Ricky Hatton, has the titles he won up on the walls at the gym and I look at them every day and tell myself that I’m going to win as many,” Zhanat said.
“I can’t look beyond this fight in Belarus, but I am confident I can become a world champion next year and I want to win all the belts out there. Edisherashvili and Mundraby are both standing in my way and I will not let them stop me accomplishing my dream.”
Thanks to the likes of Gennady Golovkin and Beibut Shumenov, boxing in Kazakhstan is popular at present and Zhanat is keen to make himself a household name.
“When I beat Guerfi for the European title, a lot more people started talking about me at home and I hope to make them very proud by becoming Kazakhstan’s next world champion. Vassiliy Jirov was a boxer I looked up to when I was younger because he was an Olympic gold medal winner and my country’s first world champion. I hope I can be a hero like he was.”
Wednesday night’s bill is being staged jointly by Hatton Promotions and World Sport Promotions. The undercard will feature undefeated light-welterweight prospect Kirill Relikh, Belfast brothers Anthony and Sonny Upton, Dmitri Atrohov and Yuri Bihoutseu.
