By Per Ake Persson
German daily paper "die Welt" writes that a Wladimir Klitschko vs. Sultan Ibragimov heavyweight unification bout is still in talks for February 23 in New York.
EBU jr. lightweight champ Leva Kirakosyan defends the title against Sergey Gulyakevich on December 22 in Rome on a OPI 2000 promotion. In the co-features EBU flyweight king Andrea Sarritzu will defend his title. EBU cruiserweight ruler Giacobbe Fragomeni is also lined up for a defense.
German veteran Oktay Urkal has reluctantly announced his retirement and will now concentrate on a career as a trainer. Urkal lost only in world title fights to the likes of Kostya Tszyu, Vivian Harris and Miguel Cotto fighting at jr. welter and welterweight. Oktay goes out at 42-4 and over 200 amateur fights in a career that was topped by a silver in the 96 Olympics.
Belgian Carmelo Ballone and Eugen Sorin Tanasie from Romania will fight for the vacant EBU bantamweight title December 14 in La Louviere.
Next upp for Danish cruiserweight Anders Hugger could be a spot on the undercard to Cantatore vs stable-and-sparmate Johny Jensen December 14 in Rome.
Natascha Ragosina takes on Akondaye Fountain on December 15 in Dessau when she goes for a fifth belt - the WBC - to her collection that already includes WBA, WIBA, GBU and WIBF, all at super middleweight.
The stories regarding former WBA and WBC super middleweight champ Mikkel Kessler having some kind of hand injury that prevented him from sparring in the final three weeks leading up to the fight against Joe Calzaghe are apparently true.
Croatian middleweight Vedran Akrap and Ukrainian Andrei Shimanski clash for the vacant EE-EU title on December 21 in Zagreb.
The former bad boy of German boxing, Graciano Roccigiani, has been released from jail from his latest sentence due to good behavior. "Rocky" will now concentrating on training fighters. Every year - for a few years more - there´s reportedly a hefty check coming in from the WBC - said to be far from the court ordered sum but still not bad.