Gervonta Davis was close to a lightweight unification fight against Vasiliy Lomachenko.
Following a statement knockout of Frank Martin in the first defence of his WBA World Title, ‘Tank’ Davis looked to keep busy by immediately entering talks with the Ukrainian, who this year won the vacant IBF belt by defeating George Kambosos Jr.
Despite positive early negotiations, Lomachenko’s manager, Egis Klimas, announced that his fighter ‘wasn’t motivated’ to compete again this year and would return instead in 2025.
“Loma is not in the mood right now. He doesn’t have the motivation at the moment. He’s taking off. He wants to spend more time with the family. … With Loma, just money is not what motivates him.
He doesn’t take anything just because of money. You can offer him millions, tens of millions of dollars – if he doesn’t have motivation, he’s not ready to prepare for the fight.”
Promoter Bob Arum said that the cancelling of talks was to do with family and Ukraine – Lomachenko previously paused his career to join the efforts against the Russian invasion – but Davis’ coach, Calvin Ford, told ES News the collapse was money-related due to ‘Loma’ not being the A-side.
“I wasn’t shocked, because in his career he usually be the one who gets the money. It wasn’t enough that he’d want it.
Ford also discussed the recent verbal altercation between Lomachenko and WBC Champ Shakur Stevenson, suggesting that it may be the beginnings of a fight.
I got other reasons – we just seen Shakur and them beefing, is he gonna come back and fight him before the end of the year? That’s the question. He supposed to be on vacation … Shakur’s tryna figure out what he’s gonna do. Everybody’s tryna figue out what they’re gonna do. I know what Tank gonna do – he’s gonna do Tank. When he ready he’s gonna say ‘yo, let’s go.'”
