Lomachenko vacates 130 lb title

Vasyl Lomachenko will vacate his WBO 130 lb championship and keep the WBA Lightweight title, according to Dan Rafael of espn.com.

“I am writing you on behalf of Team Lomachenko. As you are well aware on May 12 Vasiliy moved up in weight to challenge WBA lightweight champion ,” ’s Carl Moretti wrote to WBP President Paco Valcarcel.. “As you saw, he was successful in capturing the lightweight title. Vasiliy wishes to continue to campaign in the lightweight division. Therefore, we respectfully relinquish our WBO junior lightweight title so that an opportunity may be given to the ranked contenders to compete for the vacant belt.

“Paco, we are so grateful to you and the WBO family for affording us the privilege of being a WBO world champion from the start of his career. We hope in the near future we will once again be afforded the chance to fight for another championship with the WBO. As always, we thank you for your continued support and friendship.”

“Lomachenko will not go on Aug. 25, but it’s still possible that his next fight will be a unification with Ray,” Top Rank’s Bob Arum said, adding that after a trip home to Ukraine following the victory against Linares that Lomachenko would return to Southern California on Monday night and will meet with him and manager Egis Klimas next week to discuss his future plans.

“Loma is going to stay at 135 pounds because we believe there are bigger fights and much better competition in that ,” Klimas told ESPN. “We’ve been talking about the next fight and maybe unifying with the titles with Beltran but everything is up in the air.”