Let’s Try Again: The Battle For Best Canadian Fighter

It’s official, the fight to determine Canada’s elite fighter will take place on January 18 at the Bell Centre in Montreal.

Following the announcement in late winter last year that the mega fight to determine the best Canadian fighter between Jean Pascal (28-2-1) and Lucian Bute (31-1) on May 25 would be rescheduled, some of us worried it would never actually happen.

After several months of speculation, the kick-off press conference to make it official occurred on October 31 in Montreal, Canada.

According to promoter Yvon Michel, 15,000 tickets are already sold from a possible 21,000, which makes sense since all those ticket holders bought their ticket for the May 25 fight and were told to hold on to the tickets since a new date would be announced shortly.

Well, the tentative date was set but no one knew if the fight would actually happen until now.

This will no doubt be the biggest fight in Canadian history as both boxers are fighting for bragging rights and survival. No doubt, the loser will see his career decline from this bout. Another added bonus is that HBO will market this fight on their network and will make one of these two men a true rising star.

It was announced to the press during the conference that both fighters agreed to a WADA anti-doping test. Also, Bute will be training in Montreal, perhaps to soak up the importance of this bout whereas Pascal has chosen to train in Las Vegas, likely to get away from distractions.

Of course, neither fighter said this was their reason for choosing their training facilities, but you could suspect as much from their tone and what their respective trainers were saying.

There is no word yet on the undercard and there won’t be until after the Adonis Stevenson fight vs. Tony Bellew, scheduled for November 30.