By Richard Cloutier, Netboxe.com
Ontarian Troy "The Boss" Ross (23-2-0) will make his return to competition on October 30 when he faces Louisiana-born Carl "Kojak" Handy (24-7-2 ), who now resides in Montreal. The duel will take place at Casino Rama in Ontario, as part of the event Rumble at Rama XIII being put together by promoter Robert Waterman.
We will remind that in his last duel, Troy Ross lost by TKO against Steve Cunningham as part of a championship bout for the IBF cruiserweight title. The winner of the 4th season of the "The Contender" tournament, Ross was a Canadian and Commonwealth champion among professionals. He also represented Canada twice at the Olympic Games (Atlanta and Sydney), and played in the movie Cinderella Man alongside Russell Crowe.
As for Carl Handy, he is known north of the border participating in numerous InterBox cards. During his career, this former champion of Louisiana has not hesitated to measure himself against Thomas Ulrich, Alejandro Berrio and Lucian Bute.
For the presentation of this gala on October 30, BoxingScene.com/Netboxe.com took the opportunity to speak exclusively with the promoter of the event, Robert Waterman. If this is indeed his first steps on the Canadian scene, Mr. Waterman was certainly not the first entrant into the global industry of boxing.
Q: Hello Mr. Waterman. Thank you for answering our questions. You are a native of England, where you have already presented most of your boxing galas to date. But on October 30, you have an event in Canada, Casino Rama in Ontario. What convinced you to come and present boxing in Canada?
A: For Many Years I Have Been Like a nomad, Much of my boxing events Have Been Held Outside of the UK in The Czech Republic, the Ukraine, Monaco. During one of these events I was approached by a Canadian who said to me that he felt that my exciting events would be ideal for Casino Rama in Ontario - the rest is history.
Q: Can you tell us about your plans for your events being planned for Casino Rama and at Caesar's Casino Windsor?
A: The vision is to put on world class, exciting combat events in Ontario. This first event features Troy Ross and I hope that when he comes through this tricky contest on October 30th, his next visit to Casino Rama to fight will be for a world tile at home.
Q: Who are the boxers who will appear on the first card?
A: We have to face Troy Ross facing Carl Handy in a battle fo ten rounds. The Canadian heavyweight champion Pajkic Neven (14-0-0) will face Germany's Andreas Sidon (34-9-0). Hagar Finer (21-7-3) of Israel will face Julia Sahin (20-1-0) of Germany as part of a world title fight.
The Ontarian Lisa Brown (17-4-3), who is the WBA world champion, will face American Jerry Sitzer (14-9-1). Finally, a fight with local flavor will pit John Mercer (1-0-0) of Brantford and Milos Pantelic of Toronto.
Q: What are your objectives in the long term? Do you possibly have interests in other provinces?
A: I think I am going to be focusing on Ontario, but if a project was to be proposed in another province I would of course be interested.
Q: What is the nature of your partnership with Groupe Yvon Michel?
A: Yvon Michel Is A Leading promoter and in my mind a good man. He has been supportive of me and encouraging. We are not partners but I will be using many of his boxers as his pool of talent is excellent.
