LEONARD BUNDU vs FRANK SHABANI

Frank Shabani, one of the up-and-coming fighters in the Sauerland Events stable, has been matched in by far his toughest contest when he challenges Italy’s Leonard Bundu for the European Union welter title on Saturday’s Valuev-Chagaev show in Finland.

So far, Shabani has dominated everyone he has fought, which is to be expected with a fighter being groomed for big things. Born in Yugoslavia but based in Berlin, Shabani has won 17 bouts in a row. It should be 18 because he was winning easily against Travis Hartman when his opponent was cut in a clash of heads and the bout was declared a no decision because four rounds had not been completed.

Shabani, 27, is a strong, busy pressure fighter who normally gets results with punch volume, but in his last fight he showed a flash of punching power when knocking out Italian title contender Giammario Grassellini with a left hook in the third round of what was expected to be a solid test. I think that Shabani’s surprisingly quick and easy win decided the Sauerland people to make the more ambitious match against Bundu.

Bundu, too, is unbeaten, with 18 wins and a technical draw in 19 fights. The technical draw came in a brief but exciting fight with fellow-Italian Luciano Abis, who was cut in a clash of heads to cause a third-round ending. Bundu dropped Abis but was himself hurt by a right hand.

I had the chance to see Bundu’s last fight, when he won a unanimous decision over tall, southpaw French journeyman Frank Harroche Horta. Bundu, who was born in Sierra Leone, is a muscular fighter with a high workrate although not a lot of power. He seemed to me to be one of those constant-motion types, moving this way and that, attacking in bursts and sometimes switching quite cleverly to the southpaw stance. He had a bit of a struggle with Horta, though, suffering cuts over both eyes. The decision seemed fair to me but Horta was unhappy, remonstrating with ringsiders as he headed angrily for the dressing room.

Bundu is 34 and I have the feeling that he has gone about as far as he is likely to go — a good European-level type of fighter, but nothing grander. He was a top-class amateur who boxed for Italy in the Olympics and won a bronze medal in the 1999 world championships in Houston, and I wonder if he spent a little too long in the amateurs. Shabani doesn’t have Bundu’s extensive amateur background but he is the younger, fresher fighter, and although Helsinki is a neutral site it is to Shabani’s advantage that he is the house fighter on a Sauerland Event show.

I have wavered on this one because Shabani has never been tested and we don’t know how well he will perform against his toughest and best opponent to date. The Sauerland people don’t often get it wrong when they are plotting the progress of one of their prospects, however, and if only for this reason I would give the slightest edge to Shabani.