Heavyweight veteran Derek Chisora, who has fought both Oleksandr Usyk and Agit Kabayel, believes that one of them would have the other man for breakfast.
Kabayel comfortably outpointed Chisora in 2017, back when the former was a European champion and the latter had lost two of his previous four fights.
Since then, though, the unbeaten German has established himself as the world’s leading heavyweight contender, securing consecutive stoppage victories over Arslanbek Makhmudov, Frank Sanchez and Zhilei Zhang.
The latter win saw Kabayel claim the WBC interim title, which he defended with a third-round finish over little-known customer Damian Knyba last week.
As a result, the secondary title should, in theory, put him in a position to challenge for Usyk’s green and gold strap in the not too distant future, but only if the WBC chooses to order their clash as a mandatory title defence.
In the meantime, Usyk is widely expected to defend his WBC, IBF and WBA world titles against Deontay Wilder, with reports suggesting that their showdown – which is set to take place in America – could arrive in either April or May.
It is worth highlighting, too, that the two-division undisputed champion hopes to amass two or three more outings, including a fight with Wilder, before hanging up his gloves.
Should one of them happen to be against Kabayel, then Chisora, who lost on points to Usyk in 2020, can only see their heavyweight affair going one way.
Speaking with First Round TV, Chisora predicts the exact same outcome for fights involving Kabayel and WBO world champion Fabio Wardley.
“Usyk would eat all these boys up.”
When asked who would win a fight between Kabayel and Wardley, Chisora admitted to viewing it as a far more competitive contest, but ultimately favours his former opponent.
“Kabayel [against Wardley] – that’s a good one, because they both like to stand there. But Kabayel would win it, and I’ll tell you why: because [Kabayel is] a body-head-body-head [puncher], and Fabio’s only a head hunter.”
Chisora is one of the opponents rumoured to be in the mix for Wardley’s first world title defence, which is expected to take place in the coming months.
