Claressa Maria Shields vs. Savannah Rose Marshall

June, possibly Newcastle in UK, per Shields' co-manager Mark Taffet. Middleweight unification, with the IBF & WBA (5th defense of each by Shields), WBC (4th defense by Shields*), the Ring Magazine (2nd defense by Shields) and WBO (4th defense of Marshall**) titles on the line.

Now, you might be confused on a couple of points there, stemming from Shields' previous unification match with Christina Hammer a few years ago. *Namely, the facts that:

• * Hammer was previously the WBC titlist. She had been made "champion-in-recess" after becoming medically unable to defend the belt; Shields then captured the vacant title - the full, not an interim version - when she fought Hannah Rankin. The fight therefore counts as both Hammer's final (and unsuccessful, thirteenth) defense, and, somewhat confusingly, Shields' own third defense of the same belt to produce a single undisputed holder of the WBC title.
• ** Shields also captured the WBO title from Hammer. She was elevated the following year to "Super champion" but vacated it altogether, leaving the door open for Marshall to claim the WBO title against none other than "Miss Vacant Title Bridesmaid" herself, Rankin, two years after Shields had beaten her for all the rest. As of Shields' return to middleweight last weekend after three defenses of her 154lb titles, she defended every single world championship (so, the WBA, IBA, WBC and then-inaugural Ring Mag belts) from the Hammer unification against Ema Kozin except the WBO. This meeting with Marshall will therefore be a reunification of the female MW haul.

This will be a rematch just over a decade in the making. On the 14th of May in 2012, in the prelims of the AIBA world championship in Qinhuangdao, the British woman defeated the American by a score of 14-8 en route to eventually capturing the gold medal. This is, to date, Shields' only loss either amateur or pro in 88 bouts. And no, there's no easily found video (perhaps none whatsoever) - I've looked.

Contracts have been drawn up & ready to go with the proviso that Shields get past Kozin (which she did on Saturday via UD) and that Marshall get past Femke Hermans next month. Hermans will be be their second common opponent as professionals, after Rankin who lost to Shields via UD and Marshall via TKO7.

 

This one and Taylor vs. Serrano just over a month apart, can't remember the last time women's boxing had two relative "super-fights" (in terms of international buzz) in such close proximity. Or hell, the last time it had two such big events within a couple of years of each other!

 

Oh - and while neither of them has reached quite that level of star power, the feud between Mikaela Mayer and Alycia Baumgardner is heating up, and the fight itself should be fire!