HBO World Championship Boxing on Monday, July 11: Kovalev vs. Chilemba

On a special night, one of the sport’s top performers defends his unified light heavyweight titles when WORLD CHAMPIONSHIP BOXING: SERGEY KOVALEV VS. ISAAC CHILEMBA is presented MONDAY, JULY 11 at 10:15 p.m. (ET/PT) from the DIVS Palace of Competitive Sports in Ekaterinburg, Russia, exclusively on HBO. The HBO Sports team will call all the action, which will be available in HDTV, closed-captioned for the hearing-impaired and presented in Spanish on HBO Latino.

The fight will also be available on HBO NOW, HBO GO and HBO On Demand.

Fighting just his third professional fight in his native country, where he compiled an amateur record of 193-22, Sergey “Krusher” Kovalev (29-0-1, 26 KOs), originally from Cheylabinsk, Russia, now living in Southern California, takes on Malawi native Isaac Chilemba (24-3-2, 10 KOs) in a scheduled 12-round title contest.

Boasting one of the highest knockout percentages in boxing, the undefeated Kovalev has been a dominant force in the 175-pound division and is making his ninth appearance on HBO. Named the 2014 Fighter of the Year by a host of boxing media outlets, he’s among the sport’s fiercest punchers and is considered by many a contender for the title of top pound-for-pound fighter.

Chilemba has shown he isn’t intimidated by competing overseas, having fought in the U.S., England and Canada, and now Kovalev’s homeland. He is coming off a majority decision loss that some saw as a closer fight than the scorecards indicated.

Immediately following the fight broadcast, HBO will present an encore play of the 30-minute special “Terence Crawford: My Fight.”

Follow HBO boxing news at hbo.com/boxing, on Facebook at facebook.com/hboboxing and on Twitter at twitter.com/hboboxing.

All HBO boxing events are presented in HDTV. HBO viewers must have access to the HBO HDTV channel to watch HBO programming in high definition.

The executive producer of WORLD CHAMPIONSHIP BOXING is Rick Bernstein; producer, Dave Harmon; director, Johnathan Evans.

® WORLD CHAMPIONSHIP BOXING is a registered service mark of Home Box Office, Inc.