Lomachenko expects Linares contract signed within the next week

Boxingnews24.com

By Stanley White: Vasyl Lomachenko is saying that his promoters expect the contract to be signed by WBA lightweight champion Jorge Linares within a week for a fight on May 12th in Madison Square Garden in New York.

The News still hasn’t been confirmed by Lomachenko’s promoter Bob Arum of Top Rank. He’s in negotiations with Linares’ co-promoters at Teiken Promotions out of Japan. Linares’ promoter co-promoters at Golden Boy Promotions will need to agree to the fight as well. Arum going through only one of Linares’ promoters seems to suggest that he believes that will be enough for him to get the fight done. In other words, Golden Boy will agree to letting Linares take the fight with Lomachenko as long as Teiken Promotions are on board with it.

“As the promoters tell me, the contract with Linares will be signed within the next week,” Lomachenko said via UkraineAtamans.

There’s no word on whether the Linares vs. Lomachenko fight on May 12th will be on pay-per-view, and which network – ESPN or Showtime Boxing – will be the one that will televise it. Lomachenko is with Top Rank, and they have a deal for their fighters to be televised on ESPN. Linares, 32, fights on Showtime. Linares (44-3, 27 KOs) is the WBA World 135 lb. champion and Lomachenko the challenger. That could mean that the Linares-Lomachenko fight will be televised on Showtime.

Lomachenko (10-1, 8 KOs) is supposed to be fighting Manny Pacquiao in November on ESPN. A fight for Lomachenko against Linares on May 12th would be a good build up fight for the Pacquiao match later this year.

Lomacheno will likely be favored over Linares, as he’s looking very good right now. Linares did not look the greatest in his last defense of hi WBA title against Mercito Gesta on January 27th on Showtime from The Forum in Inglewood, California. Linares won the fight by a 12 round unanimous decision by the scores 118-110, 118-110 and 117-111. Gesta landed a lot of shots in the fight. Linares stated afterwards that he had injured his right hand in round 4. It was another hand injury for Linares, who also had hand problems in his first fight with Anthony Crolla in September 2016. Linares still won the fight with Crolla. Never the less, if Linares can’t be counted on to make it through a fight without him suffering another hand injury, then his chances of beating Lomachenko are slim.

Lomachenko will be moving up in weight from super featherweight. Lomachenko has been fighting in that weight class for the past 2 years since beating Roman Martinez by a 5th round knockout to win the WBO 130 lb. title. Lomachenko has defended his WBO title 4 times in beating Guillermo Rigondeaux, Miguel Marriaga, Jason Sosa and Nicholas Walters. 3 of those fighters – Rigondeaux, Sosa and Walters – quit. Lomachenko could have stayed at super featherweight to fight WBC champion Miguel Berchelt, but there’s bigger opportunities for him at lightweight against Linares, Mikey Garcia, Ray Beltran and Robert Easter Jr. Fighting at lightweight will put Lomachenko within range of a fight against Pacquiao.