Floyd Mayweather’s upcoming exhibition bout with Mike Zambidis will feature 15 fights across various combat sports disciplines. Before the ‘Battle of the Legends’ boxing main card gets underway at the Telekom Center in Athens, Greece this weekend, the first half of the evening will feature kickboxing, Muay Thai, MMA, and freestyle wrestling contests.
Paris 2024 Olympic bronze medallist Dauren Kurugliev and World champion Georgios Kougioumtsidis kick off proceedings in a compelling wrestling match before fans are treated to two WMC Muay Thai world title fights. European medallist Kyriakos Bakirtzis faces Charli Daines, while Thai champion Parunai Janchira locks horns with two-time IFMA World Champion Laura Fernanda Burgos Lopez. Greek MMA fighters Kostas Kolokythas and Aris Koutsodimos then take centre stage before a pair of kickboxing bouts take place between Christos Avramidis and Nikos Tavladakis, and Valentinos Kyriakidis and Omid Nosrati.
The boxing card features the debut of Ukrainian UFC veteran Ihor Potieria against Antonio Zepeda as well as the return of Mayweather prodigy Joseph Brown against Leonidas Sopranidis. There is also space for Greek amateur standouts Alexandros Beltekos, Dionysis Stroubis, Michalis Tsamalidis and Odysseas Tsakouridis on the bill.
In the co-feature attraction, Portugal’s Octavio Pudivitr takes on Roamer Alexis Angulo of Colombia for a WBC world ranking at 175lbs.
The evening will culminate in Mayweather’s exhibition with 18-time kickboxing champion Zambidis.
Mayweather and Zambidis are set to meet in an 8-round contest at super welterweight (154lbs). There will be no judges scoring the contest, and in the event that either man is stopped, it will not appear on their respective professional records. The fight has essentially been arranged as a tune-up for Mayweather for his rematch with Manny Pacquiao on September 25. Unlike his bout with Zambidis, Mayweather’s second meeting with Pacquiao is expected to be a professional fight. Their inaugural encounter in May 2015 saw Mayweather claim a wide unanimous decision victory for the WBA, WBC and WBO welterweight titles in the richest fight in the history of the sport.
The event shattered multiple records, including pay-per-view buys, pay-per-view revenue and live gate.
Mayweather-Pacquiao eclipsed 4.6million pay-per-view buys and grossed over $600million.
Their rematch is unlikely to touch those revenue numbers, although it will almost certainly be watched by more people, given that it will be free to air on Netflix.