As part of the boxing evening in South Africa in the WBC eliminator in the bridge weight Kevin Lerena (29-2, 14 KOs) won by unanimous decision Riad Merhi (31-2, 26 KOs) and became the mandatory contender for the belt, recently owned by Lukash Ruzhansky (15-0, 14 KOs).
The fight did not take place in the most spectacular fight. Both opponents boxed quite carefully, but the initiative belonged to the owner of the ring, who used a fairly simple right-left straight line combination to take round after round. Merhi revived at the end of the fight, but in the end, the judges gave the victory to the South African boxer with a score of 118-110, 115-113 and 116-112.
