By Elisinio Castillo
Heavyweight Odlanier Solis (20-2, 13KOs) took a major blow prior to Saturday's fight with Tony Thompson, when trainer Pedro Diaz and promoter Ahmet Oner had a major disagreement which led to Diaz not traveling over to Turkey for the fight. Diaz trained Solis for 95% of the camp, before last minute changes had to be made for the Olympic gold medal winner's corner. And Solis suffered a major setback in losing a twelve round decision.
Jose Perez, U.S. representative and Arena Box promoter Ahmet Oner says he did not recover from this separation, since has witnessed the relationship between boxer and technician.
"All I can say is that there were some misunderstandings between Ahmet Oner and Pedro. I'm still very much in shock [over what happened] as is everyone else and never wanted this situation to come to this point, but we had no other choice but to leave [to Turkey] without Peter," George Ebro was told by Jose Perez, the American rep for Oner.
"The final decision was made by Solis, and believe me this has been heartbreaking. Pedro for me is like a brother, but with the fight against Thompson it so close we could not stop it. The differences were very big [between Oner and Diaz]. There was no time. Solis has a family to support and a commitment to be a world champion.''
