By Mark Vester
WBO welterweight champion Paul Williams (34-1, 25 KOs) is looking to make good on his promise to fight anyone at any time. He was unable to find a solid opponent at welterweight and unable to come to terms for a fight with WBC/WBO middleweight champ Kelly Pavlik. Instead, he will still re-test the waters at middleweight by moving up to fight Andy Kolle (17-1, 12 KOs) in a ten-round middleweight contest on Sept. 25 at the Soboba Casino in San Jacinto, California. Williams fought some early career bouts at 160 before moving down to 147. The fight will air on the Versus network.
Kolle's only loss was by sixth-round TKO to Andre Ward in 2006. He's 8-0 since the Ward defeat. The co-feature will be heavyweight Cristobal Arreola (24-0, 21 KOs) against Israel Garcia (19-1, 11 KOs). Goossen told Dan Rafael that Williams will move back down to welterweight for a title defense on November 29. Arreola will also be in the co-feature of that card, with HBO televising both fights.
"Anyone willing to get in the ring with Paul from 147 to 168, he's willing to fight," Goossen said. "Believe me, there are very few takers. This opportunity presented itself with Versus for him to go out there and show the world what he has in the middleweight division. This is a good fight to gauge it on. He'll look forward to going back to defend his welterweight title in November after a victory."
Williams has also been chasing a rematch with Antonio Margarito, the WBA champion. Goossen offered a guarantee of $4 million dollars to make the fight happen, but Margarito's promoter, Bob Arum of Top Rank, was not interested, citing a personal issue with Williams' advisor, Al Haymon, as the reason.
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