Mairis Briedis vs Michał Cieślak - IBF CW title fight - 24.09 in Poland

[aicheligad]

This fight should be confirmed soon. Apparently, the only issue left is to choose the venue, there are 2 options.

How do you rate Cieślak's chances in this fight?

[margaret thatcher]

oh wow, i thought briedis was done at cruiser

interesting fight, looking forward to it. and only a month away!

[Ruthless-RKO]

Probably be in Riga..

[aicheligad]

Probably be in Riga..

Gdańsk or Gliwice I've heard.

[DrDuke]

But Briedis wanted to go at HW, called Okolie only possible CW matchup, bla-bla-bla...

[aicheligad]

The teams of Michał Cieślak and Mairis Briedis are finalizing the talks on the organization of the fight for the IBF cruiserweight belt. The duel is to take place on September 24 in Poland, but the manager of Mariusz Wach, Jerzy Mazur, claims that the match is under the question mark, because the Latvian may soon lose the championship belt.

- Briedis is bound by a contract to fight Wach and even if he would like to resign from it, he has to pay us the money stipulated in the contract in the event of such a circumstance - explains Mazur.

- So far, the promoters of Briedis have not paid us the money owed. We set the deadline for them to be August 20. If they do not pay, we can take legal action, and then the duel between Briedis and Cieślak will be blocked - convinces the manager of "Wiking" and adds "If the IBF federation decides that Briedis cannot defend his title due to contractual obligations, he can simply lose it. We had a fairly similar situation recently with Joshua-Fury's fight negotiations, which was canceled because Fury was forced into a duel with Wilder.

If case Briedis gets deprived of the title, Cieślak would box for the vacant trophy with Jay Opetaia, but according to ringpolska.pl, the amount that Jerzy Mazur is talking about isn't big, so the Latvians will probably pay and the confrotiation vs Cieślak will take place.

[margaret thatcher]

did cieslak's team come with a huge offer or something

good deal for wach then, gets paid without having to fight

[aicheligad]

did cieslak's team come with a huge offer or something

good deal for wach then, gets paid without having to fight

Cieślak has a nice sponsor who believes in him a lot. After the Congo farce vs Makabu he said that Cieślak's next title fight will be in Poland, simply because Michał deserves it.

Gonna be in PPV in Poland so it makes the offer bigger as well.

[aicheligad]

Looking at the poll results, Cieślak is a total no-hoper in this fight!

Cieślak is a tough guy, Briedis has some nice KO's on his resume but the last time he legitimately knocked someone out was Simon Vallily in 2016.

Briedis is 36, already declining, had some injuries and fights once per year. He is a favourite, but if he's not going to fight Okolie, fighting Cieślak in Poland is the toughest challenge he could choose in the CW division.

[DrDuke]

Looking at the poll results, Cieślak is a total no-hoper in this fight!

Cieślak is a tough guy, Briedis has some nice KO's on his resume but the last time he legitimately knocked someone out was Simon Vallily in 2016.

Briedis is 36, already declining, had some injuries and fights once per year. He is a favourite, but if he's not going to fight Okolie, fighting Cieślak in Poland is the toughest challenge he could choose in the CW division.

Makabu will be a tougher challenge than Cieslak.

[aicheligad]

Looking at the poll results, Cieślak is a total no-hoper in this fight!

Cieślak is a tough guy, Briedis has some nice KO's on his resume but the last time he legitimately knocked someone out was Simon Vallily in 2016.

Briedis is 36, already declining, had some injuries and fights once per year. He is a favourite, but if he's not going to fight Okolie, fighting Cieślak in Poland is the toughest challenge he could choose in the CW division.

Makabu will be a tougher challenge than Cieslak.

Styles make fights, I think that Makabu's style would suit Briedis better, Ilunga seems to be on decline as well imo (didn't looked too well vs 40 years old shot Durodola), Cieślak lost to him in a very close fight and despite all the controversies (one of them being the fact, that some rounds won by Cieślak were shorter, and when Makabu was doing better the rounds were longer, for example round 3 lasted only 2 minutes, while round 7 lasted 3:30).

So, yes fighting Makabu in DR of the Congo would be tougher, but I doubt that any decent European fighter will ever go to fight him there again.

[aicheligad]

Now it's planned for November 6 in Poland, but there are problems in negotiations. There is a danger that Cieślak will lose his mandatory challenger status in favour of Jai Opetaia.

[aicheligad]

Andrzej Wasilewski wrote on twitter that everything will be known in 1 hour.

[aicheligad]

Briedis' team didn't agreed for November 6 in Poland, still there is a possibility that this fight will land in Latvia.

[aicheligad]

There is still no promised info, not a good sign I guess.

[aicheligad]

The newest information is that we are not going to get this fight, Briedis is going to fight different opponent... screw that, Cieślak was a mandatory challenger and looks like he is not anymore