By Ryan Burton

In 2009, Mauricio Herrera defeated Ruslan Provodnikov in Las Vegas in a bout that aired on ESPN Friday Night Fights. Herrera's victory over Provodnikov was a narrow points win and after his technical decision victory over Hank Lundy this past Saturday, Herrera said he wouldn't mind facing the Russian again.

When Provodnikov heard of this news, he said he has no problem facing Herrera but would prefer rematches against Lucas Matthysse or Tim Bradley first.

The fighter known as Siberian Rocky hurt Bradley several times in their 2013 Fight of the Year.  Provodnikov dropped Bradley in the first round and the American was on shaky legs when he rose to his feet. His knees buckled and there were other questionable slips in the round that could have been ruled knockdowns.

Fast forward to June 27th of this year and Jessie Vargas hurt Bradley late in the 12th round of their fight at the same venue - the Stubhub Center in Southern California - with the same referee Pat Russell. Vargas went at Bradley to try and finish him off when Russell signaled the end to the fight with 7 seconds to go.

Russell would later say he made a mistake and with all of the crowd noise thought that the final bell has sounded. While we don't know if Vargas would have been able to finish the job, it's a shame he wasn't given the chance.

Provodnikov, who feels he did more than enough to defeat Herrera in 2009, said that Russell admitted to his promoter that he should have awarded Provodnikov with at least one more knockdown in the first round of the Bradley fight and possibly stopped the fight with Provodnikov being named the winner.

"I would be glad to close out that loss (against Herrera) on my record as well, even though it's a questionable loss just like the Bradley loss.

"We saw what Pat Russell did in the Bradley versus Vargas fight. What a disgrace. He told my promoter to his face that he made a mistake in my fight with Bradley saving Bradley from a possible stoppage in the first round when he fell to the floor twice and there was no knockdown counted.

"In the Vargas fight he made a mistake again? We should not let officials like this near this sport. They only ruin the respect and the attention for the sport of boxing," Provodnikov told BoxingScene.com. 

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