American top prospect of the welterweight division (up to 66.7 kg) Virgil Ortiz (18-0, 18 KOs) and the EBU European champion title holder from Armenia David Avanesyan (29-3-1, 17 KOs) will hold a qualifying match along the line WBC, the winner of which will become the official challenger for unified world division champion Errol Spence (28-0, 22 KOs).
As became known
boxing scene, the fight is tentatively scheduled for August 6 in Texas and will be streamed on DAZN. It is reported that Ortiz has already signed a contract, and now it’s up to Avanesyan’s written consent.
Virgil has not competed since August last year, when he stopped ex-world title contender Egis Kavaliauskas in the 8th round. The current downtime is the longest in a boxer’s career. This year, he was supposed to box against the little-known Briton Michael McKinson, first in January, then in March, but in both cases the meeting was lied to. Moreover, in March, Ortiz was hospitalized with serious health problems.
Avanesyan, after losing to the aforementioned Kavaliauskas at the beginning of 2018, has already won 6 early victories in a row. The last of them in March of this year over a certain Oskar Metz from Finland.
Virgil Ortiz on possible Spence fight: ‘He should hurry up’