Iglesias defends IBF title against Zaren; Schofield faces Bahdi for WBA belt

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Tuesday, October 6th CountryBox247, 7:00 pm ET CountryBox: Where Music Meets Boxing From Nashville, Tennessee. Your headliner is cruiserweight Craig Parker, 23-0 (22 KO) and a two-time CountryBox: Where Music Meets Boxing veteran. Hopefully, someone’s told him they’re not at the Texas Troubadour Theatre anymore… I’d hate for him to focus so much on the fight he goes on autopilot and drives straight past the Plaza Mariachi. But, hey! If Parker gets another knockout, maybe he can wrap up early enough to get over to The Troubadour in time for karaoke at the VIP Lounge! Runs until 1 a.m., seven nights a week! And, if not, Clayton Q will be providing The Music for this edition of CountryBox: Where Music Meets Boxing. If you’re worried about the state of The Troubadour in their post-CountryBox: Where Music Meets Boxing era? Fear not! They hosted a beard and moustache competition the same week as last month’s CountryBox: Where Music Meets Boxing event. They’re doing just fine. Thursday, October 8th Osleys Iglesias vs Oliver Zaren (DAZN, 6:30 pm ET) BLH will have live results and updates From Quebec City, Canada, for the IBF (and IBO!) super middleweight titles currently held by Iglesias. If you haven’t seen Iglesias yet, remedy that as soon as possible. He’s both very, very good and very, very entertaining, and has as good an eye test claim for best in the division as anyone today. Challenging him will be “The Great Dane,” specifically Oliver Zaren (and not Marmaduke). He’s undefeated, with one technical decision draw that came when an outdoor fight was stopped by a thunderstorm. Unfortunate for Zaren, but very fortunate for Patrick Stumberg, who delivered a delightful turn of phrase about what that might mean for Zaren’s prospects against Iglesias in his story announcing the fight. No real way to say for sure what Zaren’s ceiling is, but he’s in this fight because he’s the IBF’s #5 super middleweight. At the very least, Iglesias is bowing in the direction of a mandatory defense and could be available for a major fight next time around if he handles his business here. ON THE UNDERCARD: Chief support is another super middleweight showdown, with Canadian super prospect Wilkens Mathieu taking on Vladimir Shishkin. Shishkin lost to Iglesias about a year ago, but has a get-well win since then and is a very stout opponent for the 21 year old Mathieu. Arguably tougher than anyone 25 year old Diego Pacheco has faced, if you’re comparing promising youngsters in the division. Two other strong undercard matchups in Luis Santana vs Dzmitry Asanau and Imam Khataev vs Padraig McCrory should make it worth your time to tune in early for this show. Saturday, October 10th DAZN, 2:00 pm ET Misfits Boxing From London, England. Your main event here is Joey Essex vs Dapper Laughs. Essex is a reality TV guy, starting out on “The Only Way Is Essex.” Also known as “TOWIE,” the show was described by one London newspaper as “Britain’s answer to The Hills and Jersey Shore,” and is still going after 37 series and over 450 episodes. Essex parlayed that into other reality show appearances that involved celebrity high diving, celebrity ice skating, celebrity ski jumping/bobsled/skeleton (he won!), celebrity dating, celebrity trying to date but getting disrupted by exes thrown into the mix at inopportune times, celebrity cooking, celebrity trying to improve memory, celebrity special forces military training, and even more UK celeb reality shows, if you can believe it. He also has (had?) a line of hair care products under the label D’Reem Hair, the spelling and punctuation of which was presumably very carefully chosen to avoid a legal dispute with 90s Northern Irish dance pop legends D:Ream. Against him steps Dapper Laughs, who hosts a podcast about sobriety and mental health, and also did an entire tour more than a decade into his career largely on the concept of being “canceled,” irony be damned. Both of these guys have fought on Misfits shows before, and both won. There are obviously other fights on this show, including ones involving people named Cracky Tokky and Ambush Buzzworl… But, we’ve done enough here, yeah? And we can get into Cracky and Ambush the next time around, maybe? Okay, then. Floyd Schofield vs Lucas Bahdi (DAZN, 8:00 pm ET) BLH will have live results and updates From Chicago, Illinois, which we don’t say very often! This one is for the vacant WBA lightweight belt, formerly held by Tank Davis. Schofield is a very promising young lad coming off a very up and down 2025. He was supposed to fight Shakur Stevenson in February before coming down sick on fight week, did fight Tevin Farmer in a 78 second demolition in June, then had to pull out of a November fight against JoJo Diaz due to a wrist injury. Bahdi is an undefeated Canadian who got a big jump in profile after handing Ashton Sylve his first pro loss, but couldn’t really keep momentum when he followed it with a majority decision win over Armando Casamonica in support of Mike Tyson vs Jake Paul. Bahdi beat Roger Gutierrez last time out, which is impressive if you remember Gutierrez’s brief reign as a 130 lbs champ, but less so if you notice Bahdi gave Gutierrez his 6th pro loss, and that Gutierrez hasn’t won a fight outside of a Venezuela hotel since his only successful title defense in August of 2021. ON THE UNDERCARD: Ricardo Sandoval defends his WBC and WBA flyweight titles against replacement foe Sergio “Yoreme” Mendoza. Originally meant to be Oscar Collazo, but Collazo hurt his rib in training. All parties say that one should get rescheduled once Collazo mends. And, if you love American Olympians? Jahmal Harvey opens the main card, while Joshua Edwards headlines and closes the prelims on YouTube.

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World title fights starring Osleys Iglesias and Floyd Schofield headline this week in boxing!