Light heavyweight titlist Beibut Shumenov will not get the chance to unify 175-pound belts on Saturday as he anticipated, but at least he still will get to fight.

Shumenov will face former three-time middleweight titleholder William Joppy, who stepped in Thursday to save a card that was on the verge of being canceled after light heavyweight titlist Jürgen Brähmer abruptly withdrew Tuesday because of illness.

Joppy (39-6-2, 30 KOs), 40, of Washington, D.C., had been scheduled to fight light heavyweight prospect Gayrat Ahmedov on the undercard in Shumenov's hometown of Shymkent, Kazakhstan.

Brähmer left suddenly on Tuesday without alerting promoter Dan Goossen, and returned to Germany with his team and German Boxing Association chief Thomas Pütz, who also had come down with what was termed "acute gastrointestinal illness" by Universum, Brähmer's promoter.

After Brähmer withdrew, Goossen turned to Joppy and got WBA approval on short notice.

"Coming back to his hometown of Shymkent as a world champion was a major homecoming for him," Goossen said of Shumenov, who is based in Las Vegas. "With Brähmer slipping out of town, we couldn't allow the show not to go on for his homecoming. With the prime minister and so many other dignitaries attending, it would have been two devastating losses if the show didn't go forward with Beibut defending his world championship."

Goossen said Joppy did not hesitate to take the fight.

"As Joppy said to me, he wasn't going to pass up the opportunity to fight for the title," Goossen said. "He said he was in great shape coming in and believes Beibut will be on a downer with Brähmer's escape from Kazakhstan."

After the uncertainty of the past couple of days, Shumenov was relieved that he still will have the chance to defend his title.

"I trained too hard for Brähmer and will not disappoint my fans and many dignitaries, including the prime minister of Kazakhstan, attending this sold-out show," Shumenov said. "I'm putting Brähmer in the rear-view mirror and intend to get right back on track defending my title against Joppy, who I applaud for accepting this fight, and focus on collecting the other world light heavyweight titles."

Universum announced that when Brähmer (36-2, 29 KOs) arrived back in Germany he was taken to the hospital after he had "gone two days without food and suffered heavy fluid loss from diarrhea and vomiting."

"I am super disappointed," Brähmer said. "I'm sorry for Beibut, but I also trained hard. I was in the [best] shape of my life, but I caught something. This sucks. I hope it's nothing bad. The last two days were hell for me. I would wish this on nobody. I'm just glad to be back here again and want to be healthy as soon as possible."

Said Universum chief Klaus-Peter Kohl: "Rather than fly to the fight in Kazakhstan, now I have to visit Jürgen in the hospital."

Joppy last challenged for a world title in February 2008, when super middleweight titlist Lucian Bute stopped him in the 10th round. Including the loss to Bute, Joppy is 0-2-1 in his past three fights.

After the Bute fight, Joppy took two years off. He returned in March and lost a 10-round decision to Sebastien Demers. In November, Joppy fought to a 10-round majority draw against Cory Cummings. However, one judge had it for Joppy (96-94) while the other two had it 95-95.

Joppy held the WBA's middleweight belt three times and has faced numerous top fighters, although he is best known for losses to the best middleweights -- Bernard Hopkins, Felix Trinidad and Jermain Taylor.

Shumenov (10-1, 6 KOs), 27, will be making his second title defense against Joppy. Shumenov was a 2004 Olympian for Kazakhstan but did not turn pro until 2007.

He won his belt on a controversial split decision against Gabriel Campillo in a rematch of his only defeat last January. In his first defense, Shumenov survived a first-round knockdown to win a lopsided decision against previously undefeated Vyacheslav Uzelkov in July on ESPN2.