- Promotion CEO Bob Arum: ‘health and safety is the most important thing’
- Headliner Viktor Postol arrives in China hours before the announcement as officials scramble to send him back to the US
Top Rank has officially postponed its China "Super Bouts" boxing event debut owing to ongoing concerns over the Wuhan coronavirus outbreak.
The event " headlined by world champion Jose Carlos Ramirez's title defence against Viktor Postol " was scheduled for February 1 at Mission Hills Haikou in Hainan province.
"The health and safety of our fighters and everyone working on the event is the most important thing," the promotion's chairman Bob Arum said in a statement posted to its official Instagram account. "We hope the situation is brought under control soon. We look forward to staging events at Mission Hills Haikou in the very near future."
The post added that the bout would be "contested at a date and venue to be determined".
View this post on Instagram
Stay tuned for updates on a new #RamirezPostol date/location.
A post shared by Top Rank Boxing (@toprank) on Jan 23, 2020 at 8:41pm PST
Ukrainian contender Postol arrived in Haikou around six hours before the decision, while American light welterweight champion Ramirez' previous flight to China was cancelled because of the virus, Yahoo! Sports reported.
Top Rank's chief operating officer, Bradley Jacobs, added that he was trying to send Postol back to the US as soon as possible.
Poor Postol " He arrived in China six hours ago and is now looking at turning around and flying back. Top Rank's @bradleyajacobs is trying to get him back to US as quickly as possible
" Kevin Iole (@KevinI) January 24, 2020
Ramirez was to defend his titles in what was supposed to be an event welcoming the Lunar New Year. Several Chinese kick-boxers were also scheduled to fight on the undercard.
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