• Heavyweight

Chisora to face undefeated Rudenko at Copper Box

Chisora beat Ondrej Pala in November to retain his European title and International heavyweight titles © PA Photos

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Dereck Chisora's first opponent of 2014 has been announced as big-hitting "Klitschko clone" Andriy Rudenko.

Chisora (23-4, 13 KOs) will face Rudenko (24-0, 16 KOs) at the Copper Box Arena in east London on February 15 in an attempt to get a shot at a world title fight later in the year.

The Londoner, 30, who won all four of his fights in 2013 having lost four of his previous five, is expected to announce later that the fight will be a defence of his European title.

Unbeaten Ukrainian Rudenko, also 30, has knocked out all but one of his opponents in the last five years - with 10 coming inside three rounds.

And Chisora is relishing the challenge.

"Happy New Year everyone and let this be the year that I get an opportunity at the world heavyweight title and bring it back to Britain," he told BoxNation.

"Rudenko is a great start to the year for me, he's a strong, powerful and undefeated challenger who's got his own ambitions for the world title and will be coming over here to knock me out.

"I couldn't get to the Klitschko brothers, they didn't want to know about me. Vitali retired and vacated the title, but good luck to him and his political ambitions. I gave him a hard twelve rounds when we met and next time round he wouldn't have come away with the title. Wladimir looks like he'll be around for a little while longer and I've got unfinished business to settle with him so I want to get to him and finish him off.

"So for now I'm facing the Klitschko clone in Rudenko. This man can punch, he's gone the last five years knocking everybody out apart from one, but he's not carrying on with that run against me.

"The threat level goes up and so does my performance. I'll be at my sharpest against him and you'll see another destruction job from me. I'm at an ideal fighting weight, the flow of punches and power are coming together, the 2014 Dereck Chisora is going to be a real force to be reckoned with."

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