"Jeff [Lacy] will defend his titles November 5 and Showtime will televise it," says IBF super middleweight champion Jeff Lacy's promoter Gary Shaw. "SHOWTIME had November 5 reserved. Jeff was ready to fight in Cardiff, London, or any other homecourt venue Team Calzaghe desired. Calzaghe's promoter Frank Warren has been sitting on the contract I sent him for nearly three weeks. I should have known he did not want Calzaghe to fight Jeff. Having Calzaghe take a meaningless fight against a meaningless opponent. Evans Ashira was the WBO's #9 rated middleweight contender in its July 2005 ratings! Warren didn't want rounds for Calzaghe, he wanted an escape hatch from fighting Jeff. Jeff satisfied his mandatory against top-rated contender Robin Reid in August so he wouldn't be stripped and the fight would be a true world title unification fight. Reid was no warm-up fight."

Shaw had informed FightNews on Saturday: "We will go through the rankings. (Marcus) Byer, maybe (Anthony) Mundine, I haven't thought about it. November 5th will be an optional defense but Jeff is a real champion and he wants to fight real fighters. We won't fight a Evans Ashira. We will fight a true super middleweight who is ranked and who will fight a real fight."