WARREN CONFIRMS WHYTE-CHISORA III FOR DEC. 13, ITAUMA RETURN SHELVED UNTIL 2026
The trilogy fight between Derek Chisora and Dillian Whyte will headline Queensberry’s December 13 show in Manchester but Moses Itauma will no longer feature on the card.
Initially Itauma (13-0, 11 KOs) had been expected to headline the show at Co-op Live Arena with Chisora’s 50th professional outing serving as the co-main event.
Chisora (36-13, 23 KOs) had been linked with fights against the likes of Jarrell Miller but when that failed to materialise, Queensberry pivoted to one of his oldest rivals.
The fight between Chisora and Whyte had been expected to be formally announced during the broadcast of Saturday night’s event at o2 Arena, London but the paperwork was not signed in time.
Even so, at the press conference following Fabio Wardley's dramatic victory over Joseph Parker in the main event, promoter allegedly confirmed that the fight will be happening.
"The heavyweight division is alight," he told The Ring. "Think of all the good heavyweight fights we’ve had over the last two or three years, they have been amazing.
"We've got it now where we're making these fights occur, they're happening and we've just announced another one tonight.
"Chisora against Whyte is done and dusted. We’ve got a couple of bits to sort out but I’ll sort them out."
But there will now be no place on the bill for 20-year-old prodigy Itauma, The Ring's No.9-rated heavyweight.
Itauma's last outing was his first-round knockout of Dillian Whyte at ANB Arena, Riyadh on August 16 and he had been expected to box once more before the end of the year.
Queensberry had been working hard to secure another meaningful fight but had struggled to entice anybody into facing the destructive southpaw from Chatham, Kent.
However the WBA appeared to do their job for them as they officially ordered Itauma to face Kubrat Pulev, the current holder of their secondary ‘regular’ belt, with Oleksandr Usyk their full world champion. But no sooner had that order been made, it was announced that Pulev would instead face Murat Gassiev in Dubai on December 12.
Now the confusion over the situation looks set to prevent Itauma from returning to the ring before 2025 is out. The news will come as a blow to the youngster, who has completed just one round of professional boxing in the past 15 months given he stopped Demsey McKean and Whyte in the first round, and Mike Balogun in the second during that period.
When asked whether he expects Itauma to feature on the December card, Warren said: “No because if we take him and say he’s fighting on that date, the WBA will say that he’s not ready to fight Pulev and we don’t want to go down that road.
“We’ve got to see what happens with the Pulev situation because the WBA ordered the fight and he can’t get out of that. We’ll see where we go with it.
“They’re talking about going to Dubai for a Gassiev fight but, to my knowledge, the WBA have not sanctioned that fight. How can you sanction a fight if you’re putting another one out? So we are where we are.”
Instead, Whyte-Chisora III will now assume top billing in Manchester just before Christmas. Whyte is currently 2-0 against the 41-year-old Londoner after beating him via split decision way back in 2016 before knocking him out in the 11th round of their pulsating 2018 rematch.
Now, seven years on, they will clash for the third time in a fight where Chisora, still the IBF’s highest-ranked contender to champion Usyk, will likely start as favourite. Chisora has won three on the spin since losing to Tyson Fury in December 2022, with points victories over Gerald Washington, Joe Joyce and then Otto Wallin.
Meanwhile, there were some calls for 37-year-old Whyte (31-4, 21 KOs) to retire in the wake of his 119-second defeat to Itauma in Riyadh but he could not resist the chance to make it 3-0 against his old adversary.
