Via Gav Duthie: Agit Kabayel is a dark horse in the weight class. He is 22-0 (14) with impressive wins over Derek Chisora as well as Herve Hubeaux and Andriy Rudenko.
His next bout will see him face off against Croat stunner Agron Smakici 19-1 (17) for the vacant EBU title in 2023. Though his name is often mentioned. mentioned as a candidate, but his career seems to be stalling.
The EBU title was something he won and then gave up in his breakout win over Derek Chisora, and now he’s coming back to claim it in what feels like a step backwards.
The match against Del Boy took place 5 years ago and Chisora has lost 5 more times since but still fighting for the world championship. Kabayel has only fought once a year since that night and doesn’t seem to be in a hurry to get anywhere.
Whether it’s the lack of ambition or the promotional opportunity remains to be seen. Another point to be made is that the perfect recording is not quite what it seems.
He lost a few fights ten years ago and has managed to keep his record. This article discusses those and how far he can go.
Why is there no big chance
His win over Chisora in 2017 should have provided huge opportunities but no one seemed to notice. Chisora came back with a win over Carlos Takam, and no one seems to care about the carrot of the EBU title held by Kabayel.
He defended against Rovcanin and Rudenko, then gave it up to fight for the world title. His decision seemed to pay off as he was about to face Tyson Fury in late 2020, but that never happened.
If you think back, Fury beat Wilder in early 2020, but Deontay has said they have to fight again due to the rematch clause that at the time, nobody cared about.
Fury says it won’t happen, the deadline has passed and he will fight Kabayel. They then put that aside to face AJ, the trio that was usurped by the Wilder trio which, of course, turned out to be a classic in the end.
Kabayel’s last two battles were against European journeyman Pavel Sour, and former candidate turned adventurer Kevin Johnson, so does this next fight against Smakici have any more impact to hit. big it?
Hidden failures
You’d think, if he had dodged a bullet with two early losses not recorded, that his SES promotional team might have performed better given its unbeaten record and supposed virtuosity of skill. him, but not yet.
Early in his career, in 2011 and 2012, he competed in Eurosport’s ‘Bigger’s Better’ tournament, a boxer-style eight-man heavyweight tournament that won three rounds in one night. with quarterfinals, semi-finals and finals.
Kabayel entered the tournament inexperienced at the age of 19 with a 3-0 professional record.
In 2011, he lost in the quarterfinals to overall winner Evgeny Orlov, who had a career 17-18-1 (13). Orlov has lost to the likes of Johann Duhaupas x2 and Robert Helenius and, shortly after retiring, most recently to Maxin Babanin in 2022, the Russian tennis player best known for beating Tyson Fury in the amateurs.
Kabayel rejoined in 2012 and fared better, this time reaching the final but losing to Fabrice Aurieng, who retired in 2015 with an 11-8 (3) record in a final.
He lost to the likes of Dave Allen and Johann Duhaupas but took a professional win against one of France’s most famous heavyweights, Gregory Tony.
There are boxing events going on all the time that organizations are not recognized by Boxrec.
These tournaments are not recognized, so losses are not posted. This is a huge boon for Kabayel, but I’m still waiting for him to take advantage of his skills and luck.
next war
Agron Smakici is a good opponent. He has the power and had a bad win recently against Lenroy Thomas. However, his only real foray to a higher level ended in disaster when he was knocked out in the first round by undefeated Kazakh prospect Zhan Kossobutskiy.
Kabayel needs to commit this offense comfortably and hit a big fight by the end of 2023, otherwise I feel he will forever be a European level fighter.
