By Ryan Burton
Boxing fans have wanted to see Adonis Stevenson and Sergey Kovalev battle each other for several years.
The fight has lost a lot of luster now that Kovalev suffered back to back defeats at the hands of Andre Ward. In the process he lost his WBO, WBA and IBF light heavyweight titles.
Stevenson hasn't been as active as Kovalev but has retained his WBC light heavyweight title. He is scheduled to return to the ring on May 19th against Badou Jack in a Showtime Championship Boxing main event. He has only fought once in each of the past two years but hopes that will change in 2018.
"Yes definitely I will be more active this year. I don't decide who I fight but me I would like to fight in May and then again at the end of the year. I need two fights for this year," said Stevenson.
As for Kovalev, he bounced back from the Ward losses with a second round knockout of Vyacheslav Shabranskyy in November. He will return to the ring on March 3rd on HBO against Igor Mikhalkin who isn't well known in the United States.
Stevenson doesn't believe that Kovalev has recovered from the knockout loss he suffered against Ward in their rematch and he feels that the rather nondescript opponents that have been put in front of him aren't a real test to prove that he is back to being the old "Krusher".
"Kovalev, they are trying to save him but I will know as soon as he takes one good punch if he can take the punch or not. First of all Andre Ward isn't a big puncher and Andre Ward knocked him out. I don't think Kovalev is ready. I think if a good fighter pressures him and tests his chin very well - I don't think he will survive. I don't think he has recovered from Andre Ward but he has a good match up. We will see," Stevenson told BoxingScene.com and ATG Radio.
Send questions or comments to ringsidewriter@gmail.com You can follow Ryan on Twitter @ringsidewriter
