Usyk signing could lead to Fury fight in Kingdom, says director of boxing at Skill Challenge Entertainment

Amer Abdallah, director of boxing of Prince Khalid bin Abdulaziz’s Skill Challenge Entertainment, talks to Arab News about the landmark signing of Oleksandr Usyk — and other additions — to the organization, potential world title fights in Saudi Arabia and the Kingdom’s successful ventures into a diverse range of sports globally.

Oleksandr Usyk has signed to Skill Challenge Entertainment’s growing stable of local and international fighters. What made this good fit for you?

Oleksandr Usyk doesn’t need any introduction. He is the heavyweight champion of the world and the former undisputed cruiserweight champion of the world. He’s one of the elite fighters in boxing today and arguably the elite heavyweight in boxing today.

We’ve signed three fighters based on the different levels of their careers.

We started with our first signee, Ziyad Al-Maayouf; he’s Saudi Arabian.

Prince Khalid wanted to ensure that a Saudi Arabian was signed to the banner first. Ziyad is currently 3-0 and he’s new in his career.

Then we went to Badou Jack, a three-division world champion — among the best fighters in the world. A future hall-of-famer who doesn’t shy away from anybody. A great individual — humanitarian, philanthropist etc.

The third signing, which is an elite-level guy, you can put on your current pound-for-pound list, is Oleksandr Usyk.

For us strategically, it was filling each of those buckets; the prospects, the established guys and the elite.

And then Usyk, you know, he’s very versatile and very dynamic, he can fight at heavyweight, he can fight at cruiserweight, and maybe things are more appealing for him, you know, to do other weight classes.

The most important thing for Usyk right now is that he’s got to defend the WBA