Manager and trainer of Paulus Moses, Nestor Tobias, has disclosed why they accepted to fight Ghana’s Emmanuel Tagoe.
Tagoe will take on the Namibian hard punchers on October 20 at the Bukom Boxing Arena for the vacant WBO Africa lightweight belt.
Moses has not fought since losing a bid to win the WBO lightweight world title against Raymundo Beltran on 16 February, but at a press conference in Windhoek on Tuesday, he said he was raring to go and looking forward to challenging for the world title again.
Despite having turned 40 this year, Moses is still highly rated and in high demand according to his promoter Nestor Tobias.
“Everyone wants a piece of the Hitman and I got offers from all over the world to fight him. The Hitman said he will fight anyone, but we decided that the opponent must at least be a top-rated boxer,” he said.
Tobias said they received an offer to fight Tagoe for the vacant WBO Africa lightweight title because it will improve his world ranking.
“The Hitman is rated ninth in the world by the WBO now, so if he beats Tagoe his world rating should go up to fourth or fifth.
“We have studied this guy (Tagoe) and he has a good record, but the Hitman is a world class fighter and he is ready to challenge for the world title again,” he said.
Tagoe certainly has an impressive record of 28 wins and only one defeat, and is, in fact. He is former IBO lightweight champion, he won the title when he beat Mzonke Fana of South Africa on a unanimous points decision in December 2016.
Since then, however, he has only fought once, in January this year, when he successfully defended the title against Fernando Saucedo of Argentina with a tenth round technical knock out victory.