WSB, owned by the International Boxing Association (AIBA), is now coming to the end of its second season where it is currently the only professional boxing competition in the world that allows fighters to retain their Olympic eligibility.

The individual Championships at ExCeL on June 9 will see the two best fighters from each weight battle it out in seven, three minute rounds for the right to be crowned WSB individual champion and take home the prestigious WSB belt.

They come following the WSB team final at ExCeL last week where Dolce & Gabbana Milano Thunder produced a superb display to defeat Dynamo Moscow 4-1 and claim the team title.

The individual finals however, are about personal glory and at bantamweight (56kg), Elias Emigdio, the 20-year-old from the Mexico City Guerreros, starts as narrow against Baku Fires' lightning fast Gairbek Germakhanov after he won all four of his regular season fights.

The lightweight (60kg) bout is also set to be a close contest as Dynamo Moscow's powerful Adlan Abdurashidov, the 21-year-old orthodox Russian, takes on the tall Juan Romero (pictured below in red) of the Mexico City Guerreros.


Middleweight (75kg) star and Sergiy Derevyanchenko of Ukraine, the 26-year-old who helped Milano Thunder win the team final, will be looking to reclaim his title as he comes up against Baku Fires' Heybulla Mursalov but Derevyanchenko will be strong favourite and is described as the best pound-for-pound fighter in the WSB.

At light heavyweight (81kg), there will be a sensational Azeri contest when two Baku Fires heavy-hitters face-off with top ranked Azamat Murtuzaliyev battling his savvy stable mate Ramazan Magomedau for supremacy.

But the blue-ribbon bout comes at heavyweight where Italian superstar Clemente Russo (pictured below), part of the team that led Milano Thunder to glory in the team final, will face Croatian man-mountain Filip Hrgovic of Paris United.


Russo starts as narrow favourite as the 29-year-old Italian is the WSB reigning champion and is unbeaten in 15 fights in the competition.

But the Olympic silver medallist will have his hands full with Hrgovic who stands at almost two metres tall and has serious punch power.

These five fights will treat boxing fans to the very best of the WSB while there will also be an opportunity to get a preview of what the AIBA Professional Boxing (APB) will look like.

APB is arguably AIBA's most ambitious project to date and like the WSB, it will offer boxers the chance to retain their Olympic eligibility despite fighting professionally.

APB will begin in late 2013 and work in parallel with the WSB.

Tickets for the WSB individual finals are available by clicking here.

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