Wladimir Klitschko absolutely dominated WBA Heavyweight champ in recess Ruslan Chagaev for every second of nine rounds in Gelsenkirchen, Germany before 65,000 fans. Klitschko is now the WBO/IBF/IBO and Ring Heavyweight champ. But not the WBA champion. The WBA decided not to sanction Klitschko-Chagaev as an official WBA title fight even though the WBA did sanction Chagaev’s most recent defense against Carl Drummond as a WBA title fight earlier this year.
This does not make much sense. Chagaev paid his WBA sanctioning fees for defending against Drummond in February. So in the meantime, what did Chagaev do to suddenly be deemed by the WBA as NOT to be their champion if he was earlier this year?
The WBA stood to collect a rather large sanctioning fee as well if they would have put their WBA title up for grabs in Gelsenkirchen. And had Chagaev won the fight against Klitschko, they could have collected future sanctioning fees for all of Chagaev’s future WBA title defenses. And with the Klitschko win, the WBA would now have garnered their customary percentage for all future Wladimir Klitschko WBA title defenses, which as most ring observers know, considering the massive popularity of Dr. Steelhammer in Europe, those fees would be considerable.
But, curiously and mysteriously, the WBA elected to withhold sanctioning Klitschko vs. Chagaev. And now the WBA can only collect sanctioning fees from Nikolay Valuev’s upcoming WBA title defenses, which don’t exactly do mammoth business any where.
Things that make you go HMMMM. You have to wonder what in the heck could have been the WBA’s motivation here to refuse to send Chagaev in as an official WBA champion this past Saturday with the monies at stake. You have to wonder just who could have influenced their decision making on this rather illogical maneuver. The first reaction is to suspect Don King might somehow have factored into the equation but well leave it at that. We may never know the truth.
Wladimir Klitschko defeated the WBA champ Ruslan Chagaev by brutal domination – but the WBA refuses to recognize this triumphant performance. Everyone in the world who watched the fight knows Klitschko should now wear the WBA belt, everyone except Gilberto Mendoza and the good people over at the WBA.
Note: Representatives from the WBA offices are welcome to reply to this article. Any explanation for the WBA’s refusal to sanction Klitschko-Chagaev as a WBA title fight would be very welcome. Also, we would like to know if the WBA still recognizes Chagaev as their WBA Heavyweight champ in recess?
