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The IBF heavyweight title bout between Vyacheslav Glazkov and Charles Martin has been added to the January 16th, 2016 Showtime event that will feature Deontay Wilder’s title defense against Artur Szpilka.
Warriors Boxing, which promotes Martin, won the IBF purse bid last week over Glazkov promoter Main Events. Warriors Boxing then made a deal with Lou DiBella to add the second heavyweight title bout to the January 16th card.
Vacant Title
Glazkov was the mandatory challenger to newly crowned unified heavyweight champion Tyson Fury. who won the heavyweight titles by upsetting Wladimir Klitschko last month. But Fury was unable to make a deal with Glazkov after Klitschko opted to exercise his rematch clause. This forced the IBF to strip Fury of the title and order Glazkov to face the next highest-ranked and available contender for the vacant belt, and that was Charles Martin.
Easier Route
The 31-year old Glazkov, who lives in Florida but is originally from Ukraine, earned mandatory challenger status with a disputed win over Steve Cunningham last March. Incidentally, he was supposed to be Wilder’s original choice as opponent for the same fight card but backed out during the latter stages of the negotiations when the opportunity to win another heavyweight title against a lesser quality foe in Charles Martin came along. Glazkov is undefeated at 21-0-11 with 13 KOs. He was a bronze medalist in the super heavyweight division during the 2008 Beijing Olympics.
Untested KO Artist
On the other hand, Charles Martin should already be in tip top shape for this match as he was supposed to fight 2012 US Olympic team member Dominic Breazeale last December 12 but pulled out a few days prior to the fight when the IBF title shot came along. Martin is unbeaten in 22 fights with 20 knockouts. He’s stopped his last 12 opponents and is the current WBO-NABO heavyweight champion. But although Martin packs power, he is virtually untested and has not faced top level competition yet.
Wide Open Field
After Fury ended the heavyweight monotony by dethroning Klitschko, boxing’s heavyweight division has become a wide open field. While Wilder isn’t universally recognized as the world’s true heavyweight champion, he does have a legitimate WBC belt. With Glazkov and Martin disputing the IBF version of the title, a third heavyweight champion will emerge. Additionally, there is a fourth heavyweight title holder in interim WBA regular heavyweight champion Luis Ortiz who defended his title with an impressive KO win over Bryant Jennings last weekend. The presence of four champions paves way for unification matches and it won’t be a surprise if the winner between Wilder-Szpilka and Glazkov-Martin will be the first of those.
