Wladimir Klitschko’s manager told a reporter from the UK that the Ukrainian heavyweight almost certainly will face Ruslan Chagaev on June 20, the same date he was supposed to fight David Haye.

The venue also remains the same, a 60,000 soccer stadium in Gelsenkirchen, Germany.

Haye pulled out of the fight on Wednesday with a back injury. Chagaev, the WBA’s “champion in recess,” was scheduled to fight Nikolai Valuev last Saturday in Finland but was shown to have a hepatitis B antigen in his system and was not allowed to fight.

Klitschko holds the IBF and WBO belts.

“It is almost 100 per cent certain that Wladimir Klitschko will go ahead with a defense of his three world titles on the same date as he would have faced David Haye,” Bernd Bönte told Telegraph Sport. “… Obviously we are still talking money with Chagaev and there are details to sort with the WBA but we are looking to go ahead with it if it can be all be signed up.”

Haye had asked Klitschko to postpone the fight – rather than replace him – but Klitschko believed that was too risky.

“If David Haye could guarantee that he would be fit for July 11,” Bönte said, “then we would probably have gone ahead and re-scheduled, but there is no guarantee and this is the worry – that it could happen again.”

“If the injury did recur, and there is no guarantee that it would not, it would leave Wladimir in a difficult situation, because if he then had to cancel again, it would mean … he would not have made a defense of his title for nine months.”

Bönte added that Klitschko could fight Haye next year.

Michael Rosenthal can be reached at RingTVeditor@yahoo.com