By Steve Kim

On Monday July 11th from Ekaterinburg, Russia, IBF/WBO/WBA light heavyweight world champion Sergey Kovalev (29-0-1, 26KOs) returns to his home country to face Isaac Chilemba (24-3-2, 10KOs) from the DIVS Palace of Sports.

The question is will HBO - which has an exclusive contract with Kovalev - broadcast this bout?

"At this moment we don't know if HBO will televise,"admitted Kathy Duva, the head of Main Events, which is staging this promotion alongside German Titov Promotions.

"They are trying very hard to make it work. They have to chase down some technical concerns but if they can make it work technically they are committed to do this on Monday night."

Beginning with his fight versus Nathan Cleverly in August of 2013, HBO has televised the last nine Kovalev bouts and will be distributing the pay-per-view between Kovalev and Andre Ward in November.

When pressed again about the situation with HBO, Duva answered,"One step at a time, we'll work something out but at the moment the goal is to have it televised."

Kovalev was last in the ring back in January, when he dominated and stopped Jean Pascal at the Bell Centre in Montreal. Chilemba's last fight also took place in Canada, when he lost a close twelve round majority decision to Eleider Alvarez in a WBC eliminator last November at the Videotron Centre in Quebec City.

Steve Kim is the news editor for BoxingScene.com.