Tonight at the Max Schmeling Halle in Berlin, Germany, Wilfred Sauerland promotes a card full of talent as Marco Huck, Alexander Povetkin and Yoan Pablo Hernandez all get a chance to showcase their skills.

Richards (Left) and Huck go eyeball to eyeball

Headlining is WBO cruiserweight champion Marco ‘Kaptn’ Huck 27-1 (20), who attempts to make the second defence of his title against former heavyweight Adam Richards 23-2 (15) of Houston, Texas. It is what would appear to be another soft defence for Huck.

Having lost his very first world title shot to IBF champ Steve Cunningham in 2007, Huck returned to European title level and rebuilt. Two fights ago he won the WBO version of the cruiserweight crown from then champion Victor Emilio Ramirez, one of the weaker fighters to hold a World title belt, but since then Huck, in his first defence, took a real challenge in Ola Afolabi, but came out victorious with a unanimous decision win. That seemed a real step forward for Huck, but tonight’s opponent is very much a backwards step, and anything less than an impressive win will be devastating for Marco Huck’s career.

Javier Mora (Left) and Alexander Povetkin

Possibly the most competitive match on tonight’s card comes in the form of Alexander Povetkin 18-0 (13) against Javier Mora 22-5-1 (18) in a scheduled ten-round heavyweight bout. Whilst no huge risk has been taken by Povetkin and his team, Mora is a decent enough fighter.

Povetkin of course has recently teamed up with respected American trainer Teddy Atlas, and it will be interesting to see what, if any, effect Atlas is having on Povetkin. There are obvious areas of improvement for Povetkin, despite his undefeated record and the hype, so whether Atlas can make any difference remains to be seen, but Povetkin couldn’t be in better hands. Like Huck however, tonight’s fight is a must win and looking at it, I can see no way Povetkin can lose.

Cesar David Crenz (Left) and Yoan Pablo Hernandez

Also on the card Cuban defector Yoan Pablo Hernandez 20-1 (11) continues his rise into contention with a twelve round cruiserweight bout against Argentinian Cesar David Crenz 18-3 (11).

Hernandez was a hot prospect until he came up against the slightly faded former WBC cruiserweight champ Wayne ‘Big Truck’ Braithwaite, who despatched Hernandez in three rounds. Since then Hernandez has rebuilt slowly, and last time out scored the best win since his loss, outpointing then undefeated Enad Licina over twelve rounds. Whether Hernandez was too inexperienced at the time of his loss, or whether there is a deeper more fundamental flaw in Hernandez’ make-up as a fighter is unclear, and tonight’s fight wont go a whole of a long way to helping us find out. Hernandez should win fairly comfortably, but as we all know, Argentinians can be tough to stop, so it could be that Hernandez will have to go the distance.

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