{"id":67758,"date":"2021-05-06T00:19:23","date_gmt":"2021-05-06T00:19:23","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/?p=67758"},"modified":"2021-05-06T02:08:03","modified_gmt":"2021-05-06T02:08:03","slug":"bitter-aussie-boxing-grudge-match-confirmed","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/?p=67758","title":{"rendered":"Bitter Aussie boxing grudge match confirmed"},"content":{"rendered":"

After months of verbal jabs and low blows the biggest Australian boxing grudge match since Anthony Mundine<\/a> vs Danny Green<\/a> is set to take place.<\/p>\n

Tim Tszyu<\/a> and Michael Zerafa<\/a> will finally take to the ring on July 7 at Newcastle Entertainment Centre to settle one of the biggest rivalries in Australian boxing.<\/p>\n

The highly-anticipated showdown was announced on Thursday morning after months of Zerafa goading Tszyu, with a rematch clause in the fight contract.<\/p>\n

Both fighters continued the verbal warfare at the press conference, despite Zerafa promising to keep a lid on his emotions. It lasted all of one minute before the Victorian fighter accused Tszyu of "fighting Venezuelan taxi drivers" while Tszyu returned serve by labelling his opponent a "YouTube" fighter.<\/p>\n

"The talk stops," Zerafa said. "Everyone is expecting fireworks with me. He can call me whatever he wants. When I was fighting world class opponents, he was drinking warm milk before bed so it doesn't matter to me."<\/p>\n

\"Michael<\/p>\n

Zerafa also mentioned Tszyu's fight against Gunnedah fighter Wade Ryan in 2017 where the undefeated star was dropped in the first round before going on to score a unanimous points decision win.<\/p>\n

"You've never fought outside your back yard. You got dropped by Wade Ryan. I'm a different beast to Wade Ryan," Zerafa said.<\/p>\n

"At 26 years old you're fighting a 37 year old in Dennis Hogan off two losses. At 26 I was fighting Kell Brook for a world title."<\/p>\n

Tszyu made light of Zerafa's fight with Anthony Mundine but the the 29-year-old hit back.<\/p>\n

"We had to fight Mundine. Because you didn't want it. You had that many missed calls from us, you didn't want the fight. We've got international opponents, this and that. You never had anything. You didn't have any fights. Talk the truth, don't lie."<\/p>\n

Zerafa is set to drop down in weight to take on the son of boxing legend Kostya and has been chasing a bout with the undefeated Tszyu for 18 months, after confronting the star ringside after his victory over Bowyn Morgan last December at Bankwest Stadium.<\/p>\n

The Tszyu camp was reportedly in talks with Spaniard Sergio Garcia to travel to Australia for the bout but travel issues regarding the pandemic made things challenging to sort through.<\/p>\n

Tszyu (18-0, 14KO) is looking for a title shot if he can beat Zerafa (28-4, 17KO) with the super welterweight unification fight between Brian Castano and Jermell Charlo also set for July.<\/p>\n

Tszyu defeated Dennis Hogan in his previous bout in front of a huge crowd that chanted "Tszyu-castle" throughout the fight.<\/p>\n

Zerafa is coming off a controversial first-round stoppage of Anthony Mundine.<\/p>\n

The bout is set to be one of the biggest paydays of Zerafa's career with the 29-year-old tipped to pocket more than $300,000 by taking on Tszyu.<\/p>\n

For a daily dose of the best of the breaking news and exclusive content from Wide World of Sports, subscribe to our newsletter by<\/em><\/strong>\u00a0clicking here!<\/em><\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

After months of verbal jabs and low blows the biggest Australian boxing grudge match since Anthony Mundine vs Danny Green is set to take place. […]<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[1],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/67758"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=67758"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/67758\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":67760,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/67758\/revisions\/67760"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=67758"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=67758"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=67758"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}