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Artur Beterbiev apparently could care less about having home court advantage.
The WBC, WBO, and IBF light heavyweight champion from Russia will face contender Anthony Yarde on Jan. 28 in Yarde’s hometown of London at Wembley Arena.
When asked, in a recent interview, if he is at all concerned about fighting in Yarde’s own backyard, Beterbiev demurred.
“I’m not focused on the city,” Beterbiev told BT Sport. “I’m not like this person [who is obsessed with location]: London, New York, Moscow, I’m not focused on city. I’m more focused on opponent.”
Suffice to say, Beterbiev is well-travelled and used to defending his belts in places where he has no visible constituency, to say nothing of the fact that his adopted home is Montreal. Indeed, the Russian has fought most of his professional fights in the Canadian province of Quebec. Beterbiev’s last fight, a second-round stoppage of Long Island’s Joe Smith Jr., took place at the Hulu Theater at Madison Square Garden in New York City. That fight earned Beterbiev his third 175-pound title. In 2019, Beterbiev travelled to Philadelphia to unify the IBF and WBC titles against Oleksandr Gvozdyk.
Beterbiev, who has knocked out all 18 of his opponents, says he will not be thinking of the stoppage against Yarde, who is a known puncher himself.
“I never think of knockout,” Beterbiev said. “I only think about [being a] good boxer, to show good boxing.”
“Box is my work,” Beterbiev added. “If some people like how I do my work, then I’m double-timed happy.”
Beterbiev-Yarde was originally scheduled for late last year, but the bout had to be postponed because Beterbiev underwent surgery for a pre-existing injury.
This will be Yarde’s second attempt at a title. He fell short of winning the WBO 175-pound title against Sergey Kovalev in 2019, getting stopped in the 11th round.