by David P. Greisman

Nathan Cleverly’s last cup of coffee at light heavyweight had him losing his world title with a fourth-round technical knockout against Sergey Kovalev. But his next opponent won’t be taking Cleverly lightly.

“We know Cleverly can fight,” said Sam Colonna, trainer of light heavyweight contender Andrzej Fonfara, who will face Cleverly on Oct. 16 in Chicago on a Premier Boxing Champions broadcast on Spike TV.

“He’s got the name for it — Cleverly — and he’s very clever in the ring,” Colonna said. “So we’re training a little different, working on more speed, more combinations, more moving on our feet, because I know this guy’s not going to stand in front of us like Chavez did.”

Fonfara is 27-3 with 16 KOs and has won two straight since his loss to light heavyweight champion Adonis Stevenson last year, outpointing Doudou Ngumbu last November and then scoring a ninth-round technical knockout of Julio Cesar Chavez Jr. this past April.

This’ll essentially be Cleverly’s second fight at light heavyweight since coming back down to the division. The former titleholder left 175 after getting dethroned in four rounds by Kovalev in 2013. He moved up to cruiserweight in 2014, beating Shawn Corbin in May of that year, Alejandro Valori that July, and then having a rematch with Tony Bellew last November. Bellew won by split decision.

Cleverly dropped close to 20 pounds for his fight this past May against Tomas Man, weighing in slightly over 179 pounds. He won in 24 seconds, moving his record to 29-2 with 15 KOs.

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