Big time beckons after Fa floors unheralded opponent
Junior Fa and his team are negotiating what they are calling the “ultimate” fight for next year which they say will put him on the world stage.
The Kiwi heavyweight, who on Saturday night extended his unbeaten record to 16 victories with his first-round stoppage of the hapless Argentine Rogelio Omar Rossi in Christchurch, said the fight could happen in the United States in March or April next year.
He and his manager Mark Keddell were remaining tight-lipped on a possible opponent, but the logical conclusion is that it is WBC world champion Deontay Wilder.
Fa and Wilder are both promoted by American Lou di Bella, with the pair recently training together ahead of Wilder’s controversial draw against Tyson Fury in Los Angeles.
Wilder is in talks with Fury over a rematch and also with WBO, WBA and IBF champion Anthony Joshua, but neither of those two fights will be straightforward to make and the American could see Fa as a good back-up bout.
It’s difficult to know whether Fa would be ready for such a challenge because Omar Rossi, a former cruiserweight who has fought only seven times in the last seven years, put up little opposition.
On the main undercard bout to Joseph Parker’s clash with Alexander Flores, Fa struggled to find his range early but when he did the fight was effectively over. A nice straight right hand found a home on Omar Rossi’s jaw and down his opponent went.
Keddell said afterwards: “We’re negotiating a big fight at the moment so we’ll see how that goes. We have some business to do that’s probably not to do with Joseph Parker for a couple or three fights and no doubt our profile, if all things go to plan, will be rather high. He will be at the same type of level [as Parker].
“We’re talking the ultimate of the ultimate — and we’re getting pretty close.”
Fa needed an emphatic finish after disappointing recent performances, and he got it.
“I know that I rushed things a bit,” he said. “Right now I probably rate myself a seven or a six.
“I could feel my right hand connecting clean. I saw a little bruise on his nose and a lot of blood coming out of it — a possible fracture. So then I smelled blood and went for it. I possibly rushed it but I got the result I wanted.”
Fa overcame mental adversity on Saturday. He is close friends with the family who lost their 4-year-old daughter in the scrum machine accident near the Manurewa Rugby Club recently and Fa made a heartfelt tribute in the ring afterwards.
“As soon as it was finished all of the emotions came in at once,” Fa said. “I cried and felt all the sadness. I’m still sad right now. It’s a very sad thing to know that I’m going to go home and I’m not going to see their daughter anymore.”
A fight with Kiwi rival Parker remains a possibility for next year.
“There’s not too much tension between us, but I know their team doesn’t like me,” Fa said.
“Person to person we tend to be fine.”