Ringside Report Takes a Closer Look at Former WBA Super Lightweight Champion Kiryl Relikh

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By Donald “Braveheart” Stewart

There is currently quite a thing going on about Eastern European fighters in boxing circles In the UK. We seem to be a little in awe of them, be it Vasyl Lomachenko or Aleksandr Usyk or Alexander Povetkin. They all have an attraction as they have emerged from the darkness of a Soviet regime that is now part of history and no longer an ever present danger. That danger has transferred from the institutions to individuals who have come from the countries once ruled by Moscow.

Our fascination has seen us spend the last three decades trying to unravel their training regimes, their drug abuse in certain sports and the way they took in the young and pushed out the medals.

But now there are countries where there was once mist. Now we have individuals where there was once blocks. Now we have a plethora of countries which are as exotic as they were once mystifying.

One of those emergent nations is of course, Belarus. Currently at the head of international condemnation because of its authoritarian president and regime, it has punted out a few very decent people, one of whom is the light welterweight former world title holder, Kiryl Relikh, 23-3, 19 KO’s.

The 30-year-old is well known to us in Scotland as he appeared in 2011 as an unbeaten challenger in to take the WBA title off the waist of our very own Ricky Burns. Currently a top ten super lightweight, Relikh was rebuffed by Burns, though not wholly convincingly, but not before we got to see his prowess and ability up close. It took 21 unbeaten fights to get him to Glasgow and his world title chance which began in April 2011 when he made his professional debut against Alexey Naboischikov with a 4 round points win to send him on his way.

He had collected the WBA intercontinental belt and defended it twice with three stoppages and performances in three different countries that took him from the exotic to the functional: Bolton to Monte Carlo…

He then found himself, after the Burns fight, in a contentious double header against Rances Barthelemy. Relikh lost the first fight on points, in May 2017 but was unhappy with the result. He returned in the second in April 2018 to take Barthelemy’s unbeaten record at the second time of asking with a substantially wide points win. The second fight was for the WBA title. Relikh now had a belt and had bargaining power. He had won it at the second attempt.

When he was entered into the World Boxing Super Series, given the company he was placed amongst, many saw him as the easiest of touches as world champion and the one most would like to get drawn against as it was a belt he could be giving up far more easily than some of the others in the competition.

His first fight in the WBSS was against Eduard Troyanovsky and his WBA belt stayed where it was after a unanimous points decisions, though close was emphatically all on his side: perhaps he was not the easy touch people thought.

His semi final opponent was less likely to be rolled over.

Regis Prograis dropped him in the first round with a body shot from which Relikh never really recovered. The towel flew in in the 6th round and his title was gone. The WBC diamond belt was also on the line.

His last fight, as part of the WBSS, was last April. He is based in Minsk, the capital of Belarus. The world is considering sanctions against the European country as it is in turmoil. Even without the pandemic, getting out to fight might have been difficult given the political set up in Belarus. Now there are issues with which Relikh and his team will have to wrestle that go far beyond the problems encountered elsewhere in the boxing fraternity. As a fan, I hope there is always a way – isn’t there always a way?

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