By Luke Furman
For former IBF middleweight champion David Lemieux (39-4, 33 KOs), his career will be at stake when he faces Irishman Gary "Spike" O'Sullivan (28-2, 20 KOs) on September 15 at T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas.
A loss to O'Sullivan would be even more devastating than last December's lopsided decision loss to WBO champion Billy Joe Saunders. O'Sullivan also suffered a one-sided decision loss to Saunders a few years ago.
Lemieux vs. O'Sullivan will be a featured bout on the HBO Pay-Per-View undercard to the Saul "Canelo" Alvarez vs. Gennady Golovkin rematch.
After leading Eleider Alvarez to the WBO world championship at the expense of Sergey Kovalev a few weeks ago, veteran trainer Marc Ramsay will now try to revive his other fighter's career.
Ramsay realizes that his fighter's back is against the wall - and they need this victory at all costs.
"We have to get past O'Sullivan, we have no choice," Ramsey said to La Presse.
"But we do not want to put unnecessary pressure on him either. We identified the opponent, identified the risks, we did not fear to stir in the recent performances and we believe in gaining the victory. If we give the best possible performance in training and during the fight, we will win."
"There will be no big presentations in the ring. It is said that David has a higher skill level, that he is faster, and I am convinced that he punches harder than him, even if O'Sullivan is a good slugger. But we do not intend to go down to his level and fight a street fight with him. We want to force O'Sullivan to follow us in there."
The fight was not easy to make, as both boxers are in line to fight the winner of the evening's main event between Canelo and Golovkin. But a deal was eventually reached and both fighters have been stirring the pre-fight pot with their knockout predictions.
Luke Furman covers boxing for bokser.org.
