By Ruslan Chikov
WBA cruiserweight champion Denis Lebedev (24-1, 18KOs) is not happy with the manner that he won his championship. Lebedev was the interim-champion up until a few days ago. Guillermo Jones was downgraded to the status of "champion in recess" and Lebedev was elevated to the position of full champion. Lebedev feels no satisfaction and would have rather captured the title by defeating a good fighter. Instead, because Jones continued to withdraw from scheduled fight dates, the sanctioning body had no choice but to hand over the title to Lebedev, who still hopes to return on December 17th in Russia.
"It's nice to be a world champion, but I'm not full of joy - because I wanted to win [the title by fighting] against a good boxer. I'm still going to continue to train to enter the ring and win, to please the fans. I do not regret that I got the title without a fight, but somehow it's not the way that I had imagined I'd win it. For Guillermo Jones, I prepared at least six months. And every time the date would get postponed. He had a sore shoulder, the hand was hurt... But I always continued to stay keep fit: running, jumping rope, working with weights," Lebedev said.
