By Gary Anderson

April 25 - Gairbek Germakhanov of Azerbaijan (left) will take on Kazakhstan's Madi Shulakov in the Almaty Sports Palace ©WSBDefending World Series of Boxing (WSB) champions the Astana Arlans Kazakhstan will host rivals Azerbaijan Baku Fires at the Almaty Sport Palace tomorrow night as the second of this season's semi-final clashes gets underway.

Last night saw the Cuba Domadores secure a 3-2 lead over the Russian Boxing Team in the other semi-final in Moscow and tomorrow night's match-up is expected to be equally as close.

The Arlans will be hoping for a repeat performance of their last appearance at home as they crushed Team Germany 5-0 to book their place in the last four, while the Fires come into the contest off the back of a 4-1 loss to Dolce & Gabanna Italian Thunder and only made it through thanks to a 5-0 whitewash in the first-leg against the Italians.

Light flyweights Temirtas Zhussupov and Khamza Nametov will be first into the ring tomorrow and Azerbaijan's Nametov, who is five years younger than his opponent, is fancied to shade this bout and record his fourth win in the season's competition.

The bantamweight clash between home favourite Madi Shulakov and 2012 WSB individual champion Gairbek Germakhanov looks like a hard one to call.

Shulakov has only had one outing this season which was a home points win in week seven against Russia's Nikita Fedorchenko while Germakhanov has one win and one loss on his record so far.

An equally close contest is expected at light welterweight as Azerbaijan's number three ranked fighter Gaybatulla Gadzhialiyev takes on the number four ranked Askhat Ualikhanov.

Both fighters have a 3-1 record this season, with Ualikhanov going down to Germany's Artem Harutyunyan in his last outing but will be encouraged by the fact that Gadzhialiyev's only loss this season came at the Almaty Palace against Russian Maxim Dadashev in week nine.

Abdulkadir Abdullayev of the Fires (left) and the Arlans' Vasilli Levit are expected to produce some fireworks in their heavyweight clash ©WSBAbdulkadir Abdullayev of the Fires (left) and the Arlans' Vasilli Levit are expected to produce some fireworks in their heavyweight clash ©WSB



The outcome of the middleweight clash appears to be clear-cut but boxing matches are not decided on paper.

The Fires' Soltan Migitinov looks to have it all to do as he comes up against one of the greats of the WSB, Sergiy Derevyanchenko.

The Ukrainian is a two-time individual champion and has only ever tasted defeat once in 23 bouts in the WSB and boasts a 4-0 record this season while Migitinov has only had one outing this season, albeit a technical knockout win over Mexican Juan Antonio Mercado.

Vasilli Levit will be confident of securing a second successive win over Azerbaijan's Abdulkadir Abdullayev in their heavyweight clash.

Both men met in week one and it was the Kazakhstan fighter who emerged victorious registering the first of his five wins in this season's competition.

But he will be wary of Abdullayev's explosive power after he became the first man to knock out WSB legend, and two-time World Championship gold medallist Clemente Russo of Italy in their quarter-final clash.

The second-leg meeting between the two sides is scheduled for the Guba Olympic Complex on May 3.

The return leg between the Cuba Domadores and the Russian Boxing Team is down for decision at the Ciudad Deportiva in Havana on May 2.

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