Arsen Goulamirian vs Tommy McCarthy Possible For April 1
Arsen Goulamirian vs Tommy McCarthy In Play As Irishmen Could Land Surprise Title Shot
BOXXER have been attempting to take control of the cruiserweight division in the UK and Ireland and secure world title shots for top contenders Richard Riakporhe and Chris Billam-Smith, but NoSmokeSport has learnt that neither are the closest to a title shot in the division domestically.
France’s Arsen Goulamirian (27-0, 18 KOs) will defend his WBA (Super) Cruiserweight world title on April 1 in Paris, France and Belfast’s Tommy McCarthy (20-4, 10 KOs) could be the man in the opposite corner. McCarthy is ranked #13 by the WBA.
NoSmokeSport reached out to both McCarthy and Goulamirian at the time of publishing for comment but neither responded as this goes out.
Goulamirian plans to unify his title with Britain’s WBO champion Lawrence Okolie in 2023. Okolie defends his title against New Zealand’s David Light on March 25 at the AO Arena in Manchester, live on Sky Sports. Okolie is expected to continue his career with Ben Shalom’s BOXXER which represents contenders Riakporhe and Billam-Smith as previously mentioned.
McCarthy is a surprising consideration for the defence in some ways as has not had a notable win since his back-to-back defeats to Billam-Smith in 2021/2022. Since then the Irishmen has picked up two comeback wins and now could be in line for the biggest fight of his career.
The pair have previously been in negotiations to face each in 2020 pre-pandemic so in that way, it’s not a complete shock that this fight is being revisited.
Cruiserweight has been in somewhat of a limbo since the departure of former undisputed champion Oleksandr Usyk. The last four years have been difficult for the division with vacant titles, controversial knockouts, legal battles over contractual status, sanctioned fights against super middleweights, and Super Mario YouTube callouts dominating the conversation instead of unifications but 2023 could finally be the year that changes.
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