Billy Joe Saunders Injured, Upcoming Title Defense Rescheduled
Middleweight champion Billy Joe Saunders finally got an opponent for his title defense at the end of the month and now that fight was called off.
Saunders suffered a hand injury recently and promoter Frank Warren announced that the entire card had been moved to November 26. Saunders was set to defend his title against Artur Akavov.
It had been a rough time for this Europe-heavy fight card as British middleweight champion Chris Eubank Jr. had to withdraw from his title defense due to an elbow injury.
The announcement of Saunders’ injury was followed by yet another champion withdrawing from the card. British junior middleweight champion Liam Williams suffered an injury during a sparring session. He was set to defend his title against Ahmet Peterson. Warren said that he laments the fact that so many problems arose and forced the card to be moved.
“We have obviously not had a lot of luck with this event, first of all being let down by Chris Eubank Jr. and now the two main fights on a card falling out on the same day,” Warren said. “We have no choice but to postpone the card to a month later so everyone is given time to recover.”
Due to Eubank suffering an injury, his title was vacated and so Tommy Langford and Sam Sheedy were going to fight for the vacant title. Warren said that he feels terrible having to cancel the fight between Langford and Sheedy.
“I apologize to the fans for any inconvenience this may cause,” Warren said. “It is extremely frustrating as the event is already essentially sold out and we were all geared up for a cracking night of boxing on October 22 in Cardiff. I am particularly gutted for Tommy Langford, who has sold around 2,000 tickets for his British middleweight title challenge against Sam Sheedy, but I’m sure his support will no doubt still be out in force on November 26.”
Since winning the WBO middleweight title last December, Saunders had not defended the belt since then. He was challenged by Gennady Golovkin throughout the summer and the two never got to negotiate a fight.
