(August 23rd) Eddie Hearn and Matchroom are delighted to announce the signing of one of boxing’s biggest megastars in Shakur Stevenson.

The WBC World Lightweight Champion (22-0, 10 KOs) will defend his championship against former IBF Super-Featherweight king Joe Cordina on October 12 in the upcoming Riyadh Season spectacle in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia.

His Excellency Turki Alalshikh confirmed today that the 27 year old, three-division World champion will battle Welshman Cordina on the same night Dmitry Bivol and Artur Beterbiev contest the Undisputed Light-Heavyweight championship.

A future showdown with mandatory challenger William Zepeda awaits the winner – and Stevenson is confident he will set-up a mega-fight with the undefeated Mexican.

“I am ready to start this next chapter of my career and it begins on October 12 with Joe Cordina on the stacked Riyadh Season card in Saudi Arabia,” said Stevenson.

“I've made it clear that I want the biggest names and the biggest fights in the sport. Bring on William Zepeda at the top of 2025 and I'm ready for anyone who is brave enough to step in the ring with me. There have been few willing to take on that challenge in recent years.

With Matchroom and Riyadh Season, I am teaming up with a promotional force that matches my world class talent. We will be unstoppable in and out of the ring, and I will continue to show my dominance for many years to come in the sport of boxing.”

Matchroom Sport chairman Eddie Hearn believes Stevenson is a generational talent, who will etch his name in history as one of the sport’s all-time legends.

“I am delighted to welcome what I believe is a pound-for-pound great to the Matchroom team,” said Hearn.

"Shakur Stevenson is 27 and already a three-division World champion and might be unbeatable in the sport of boxing.

"This young man should be a global superstar, and I believe with our machine behind him, he will land all the big fights and receive all the credit that he deserves.

"The journey begins on October 12 in Riyadh on a huge card, and we cannot wait for the future together.”

Southpaw Stevenson dismantled Artem Harutyunyan in July in front of his hometown fans in Newark, New Jersey, winning via a classy unanimous points victory.

The American captured the WBC Lightweight crown back in November 2023 when he outpointed Edwin De Los Santos in Las Vegas to land the vacant belt.

Stevenson boasts a flawless resume – having defeated the likes of Oscar Valdez, Robson Conceicao and Jamel Herring – which has seen him collect the WBC and WBO Super Featherweight straps, along with the WBO Featherweight title during an incredible career to date.

Matchroom Boxing will provide details on a launch press conference with Shakur Stevenson in Los Angeles next week in due course.

About DAZN Group
DAZN Group is one of the fastest growing sports media companies in the world. Headquartered in the UK and with employees in over 25 countries, our businesses touch every aspect of the way fans engage with sports; from production, through to content distribution and commercialization. DAZN Group is home to DAZN, the leading global sport destination, as well as the popular sport portal, DAZN News. DAZN is leading the charge to give sports fans around the world access to sport anytime, anywhere. DAZN guarantees affordable access on most connected devices including smart TVs, set-top boxes, streaming sticks, smartphones, tablets, PCs and game consoles. DAZN is now live in more than 200 countries and territories after first launching in Germany, Austria, Switzerland and Japan in 2016.

DAZN is a leading digital sports platform in Italy, Spain, Germany, Belgium, Portugal, Japan, Canada, US and the UK.  Its wide range of exclusive content includes top-flight football from the world’s most popular competitions – Bundesliga, English Premier League, J.League, LaLiga, Serie A, and the UEFA Champions League, in addition to the biggest sports from around the world - Formula 1, NFL, NBA, MotoGP and the UFC.  

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About Matchroom Boxing

After the success of snooker in the 1980s, Matchroom Sport moved into boxing with two small hall shows followed by Frank Bruno v Joe Bugner at Tottenham Hotspur’s ground – the biggest boxing event of 1987. That launched the company into the boxing big-time, a position it has maintained ever since.

Through the 1990s Matchroom Sport’s boxing roster featured many of the biggest names in the sport including Lennox Lewis, Nigel Benn, Chris Eubank, Steve Collins and Naseem Hamed, all in world title fights and it continues to work with some of the biggest names in UK boxing including Audley Harrison, the 2000 Olympic Super-Heavyweight gold medalist.

Over the years, Matchroom Sport has built up long-standing relationships with broadcasters around the world and with the advent of the Prizefighter phenomenon, the company’s boxing division has never been in a stronger position.

From fantastic six round scraps between the sport’s journeymen, up to multi-million-dollar World Championship contests featuring the above fighters, the Pro Box series has it all. Each show is packed with the very best in boxing action in a series that encompasses almost 25 years of Matchroom Sport’s commitment to bringing the highest quality to the global television market.