W. Klitschko: I Hope Rahman Doesn't Defeat Povetkin

By Luke Furman

On July 7th in Bern, Wladimir Klitschko (57-3, 50 KOs) will defend his WBO/IBO/IBF/WBA titles against Tony Thompson, and then a week later, in Germany, WBA "regular" champion Alexander Povetkin (24-0, 16 KOs) will make a mandatory defense against Hasim Rahman. Wladimir is actually hoping that Povetkin pulls through to set up an eventual fight between two Olympic champions (1996 and 2004).

"If Povetkin loses to Rahman, it would be disappointing. In the end, Alexander is one of the contenders to fight with me. He has the WBA world title, and I'm [the WBA's] super champion. Having more than one [heavyweight] title in the organization is indeed strange. I only became the WBA champion in July when I beat Haye, but still I don't make the rules of the organization. Perhaps in this way, they want to promote our fight. I'm interested in the fight against Povetkin. He is well trained and has an interesting balance [of skills]. I was surprised at his disposition in the last fight with Marco Huck, but this sometimes happens to boxers," Klitschko said.

Luke Furman covers boxing for bokser.org