Rabchenko Stays Focused

Sergey Rabchenko is not letting talk of a world title challenge affect his focus ahead of his clash with Adriano Nicchi.

The Belarusian ace defends his European light-middleweight crown against the tough Italian at the Salle des Etoiles venue in Monte Carlo on March 30.

However, WBC president José Sulaimán has recently hinted that he could be handed a final eliminator for the sanctioning body’s title against Erislandy Lara. Victory in that fight would set up a massive showdown with Saul Alvarez later in the year.

"It’s one fight at a time. I am now only focused on the fight one against Adriano Nicchi in Monaco," Rabchenko said. "For the other matters, I leave that to my managers, who have perfectly guided my career so far.

"I certainly respect Nicchi as my next opponent and cannot look past him. He’s the reigning Italian champion, and will certainly come to win.

"I am getting ready for this new challenge and everything is going very well in my preparations."

32-year-old Nicchi last week stated he had seen flaws in Rabchenko’s technique which he plans on exploiting.

The European champion, however, believes his foe is merely reading too much into his defence against Cedric Vitu this past November.

"By far Cedric Vitu was not my best performance," Sergey admitted. "Maybe it was due to a long training camp, maybe to the fact that I was not focused because my mentor, Ricky Hatton, was boxing in his comeback fight on the same night.

"But this time Ricky will be with me and you’ll see the best of me in Monaco. I am totally confident I’ll defeat Adriano Nicchi and go to the next step in my career."

Rabchenko v Nicchi appears on the same bill as Gennady Golovkin’s world middleweight title fight with Nobuhiro Ishida and the Million Dollar Super Four tournament featuring super-middleweight hopefuls Edwin Rodriquez, Zsolt Erdei, Denis Grachev and Ezequiel Osvaldo Madena.

February 21, 2013