By Gregory Stangrit
Egis Klimas, manager for WBO/WBA/IBF light heavyweight champion Sergey Kovalev, is not ruling out the possibility of an upset on March 26th, when unbeaten contender Sullivan Barrera (17-0, 12KOs) of Cuba will face former super middleweight king Andre Ward (28-0, 15KOs) at the Oracle Arena in Oakland, California.
There is already a deal in place for Ward and Kovalev to face each other in an HBO showdown in the fall.
Kovalev returned to action last month and stopped Jean Pascal in a rematch. He is planning to fight again in June. Ward, should he beat Barrera, is going to take another fight in the summer before eventually facing Kovalev on a date in November - if everything goes as planned.
Klimas believes everyone is looking too far ahead.
Ward has been very inactive in the last few years and suffered numerous injuries. He's only fought once since November of 2013. The last time he came to the ring was last June when he stopped Paul Smith, who is more of a blown up super middleweight. Ward was going to fight last November on the Cotto-Canelo pay-per-view undercard, but withdrew with a leg injury.
Barrera is a legitimate light heavyweight, trained by Abel Sanchez, who saw action four times in 2014 and three times in 2015.
"Let Ward first beat Barrera [before we start talking about Kovalev-Ward]. This is a very difficult fight. It may happen that Kovalev would eventually fight with Barrera, and not with Ward. Andre has not been in the ring for a long time. We do not know what to expect from him. I look forward to this fight, probably more than anyone else," Klimas told ES News.
Gregort Stangrit covers boxing for Allboxing.ru.
