By Ryan Burton
WBA/WBO/IBF light heavyweight champion Sergey Kovalev was excited when the idea of fighting in his home country of Russia was brought up. The date of November 28th was tentatively set but the fight ended up being scrapped for various reasons.
Kovalev said one of the main issues was the amount of money that potential opponents wanted to fight him in Russia. With his stature in the division and in the sport in general, Kovalev said that he should command bigger purses.
"I was disappointed because you know a while back in Russia the economy wasn't good. There was a crisis. We had an invitation and we were ready to make a fight but we couldn't find an opponent. They wanted a lot of money but when am I going to get good money? We are always paying opponents a lot of money and sometimes I have to pay an opponent more money than me just to fight. I fought 18 fights for free. I think I should start to get more money for this job," Kovalev told Boxingscene.com.
Main Event's CEO Kathy Duva chimed in that they still want to fight in Russia in the future but that they wanted to move straight to the Pascal fight in Canada with a showdown against Andre Ward looming for the fall.
"Also, while we were trying to work that deal, the Ward fight presented itself and with the timing it just made more sense to go to the Pascal fight and the decision was made to go fight in Russia later," said Duva.
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