World Middleweight Championship Bout

Janibek Alimkhanuly and Andrei Mikhailovich meet for a Weigh-In ahead of Their Fight

Andrei Mikhailovich and Janibek Alimkhanuly face off during their weigh-in / Foxsports.com.au.

By Daniel Mukenya

Andrei Mikhailovich will be challenging Janibek Alimkhanuly, the IBF middleweight champion in a headliner set for Friday, October 4th at The Star, in Sydney, Australia.

Janibek Alimkhanuly (15-0, 10 KOs) is a Kazakh professional boxer and unified middleweight champion who has held the WBO title since 2022, and the IBF title since October 2023. As an amateur, he had quite an achievement, he won gold medals at the 2013 World Championships, 2013 Asian Championships and 2014 Asian Games.

Andrei Mikhailovich (21-0, 13 KOs) Driessen is a Russian-born, New Zealand-raised professional boxer. He has won multiple New Zealand national championships in two weight classes from light middleweight to middleweight. At the regional level, Mikhailovich also won the IBF Pan-Pacific and WBO Global middleweight belts.

Their weights came in with Janibek weighing 159.5 lbs and Andrei weighing 160 lbs.

Janibek has been quite busy on X with several posts hitting at his opponent.

“Who said I can’t make weight? Who said I have to go up to 168 pounds? Who said I can’t do anything? Guys, tomorrow I’m fighting at 160 pounds. And I have two championship titles! Alhamdulillah!”

“Everyone knows that I don’t talk much at press conferences. I will talk in the ring!” These are the most recent posts by Janibek on his X account in regards to the fight.

Janibek believes he will be able to land a first-round knockout against the unbeaten # IBF Mikhailovich. The fight was supposed to take place last July but had to be pushed forward after Janibek suffered severe dehydration while attempting to make weight and had to pull out.

Janibek will be attempting his fourth overall title defence and first of the IBF belt. He will retain both titles if he wins the fight but a loss will see Andrei take home the IBF title, while the WBO belt will be left vacant.

Since this will be the first time Andrei will fight for a title in his career, the timing of the fight means it is for one belt and not two. Unified titlists are spared same-day weight checks under IBF rules, but only when more than one title is at stake. Since that is not the case here, Janibek and Andrei are bound to the IBF rules.