A previously agreed-upon fight between Israil Madrimov and Magomed Kurbanov finally has a home.

The WBA-sanctioned 154-pound title fight has been added to the March 8 ‘Knockout Chaos’ show in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, event handlers confirmed Thursday. The fight will serve in support of the Anthony Joshua-Francis Ngannou heavyweight clash and is now one of two title fights on the card.

Both camps have been led to believe the fight will be for the WBA 154-pound title. The current claimant is Jermell Charlo (35-2-1, 19 knockouts), The Ring champ who was previously the undisputed champion before he relinquished the WBC, IBF and WBO belts.

Uzbekistan’s Madrimov (9-0-1, 6 KOs; No. 6 at 154 by The Ring) filed a petition with the WBA to enforce his overdue mandatory title shot. The move forced the fight versus Russia’s Kurbanov (25-0, 13 KOs) to be placed on hold until that matter was resolved. WBA representatives have not yet responded to multiple inquiries left by The Ring seeking clarification or comment.

The event’s other sanctioning body title fight pits WBC featherweight beltholder Rey Vargas (36-1, 22 KOs; No. 3 at 126 by The Ring) versus England’s Nick Ball (19-0, 11 KOs; No. 10 at 126). The show also features an interim WBO heavyweight title fight between current claimant Zhilei ‘Big Bang’ Zhang (26-1-1, 21 KOs; No. 3 at heavyweight) and former full WBO titlist Joseph Parker (34-3, 23 KOs; No. 4 at heavyweight).

Charlo was relieved of his WBO and IBF title defenses for failure to defend versus his named mandatory challengers and was recently downgraded to ‘Champion in Recess’ by the WBC.

Madrimov has been the mandatory challenger for more than a year. An effort to secure stay busy fights has only produced one such contest—a ten-round win over Houston’s Raphael Igbokwe last April 8 at Boeing Center at Tech Port in San Antonio, Texas. Madrimov was previously in talks to face England’s JJ Metcalf, whose team ultimately declined the opportunity for a targeted Jan. 27 fight.

Just one fight came of his 2022 campaign as well, a technical draw versus Michel Soro (35-4-2, 24 KOs) after just two rounds. Their July 2022 meeting occurred seven months following Madrimov’s controversial ninth-round stoppage of Soro, The Ring’s No. 8 contender, in their December 2021 title eliminator in Tashkent, Uzbekistan.

Madrimov was spared a trilogy clash when Soro dropped a highly questionable split decision to Kurbanov last May 6 in Ekaterinburg, Russia.

Kurbanov also has decision wins over former titlists Patrick Teixeira (33-4, 24 KOs) and Liam Smith (33-4-1, 20 KOs; No. 9 at 160 by The Ring).

Should the WBA make its full belt available, it will officially mark Charlo’s last tie to a physical sanctioning body title. He remains The Ring champion but never made a single undisputed title defense following his May 2022 knockout win over Argentina’s Brian Castaño.

Jake Donovan is a senior writer for The Ring and vice president of the Boxing Writers Association of America. X (formerly Twitter): @JakeNDaBox