The journey towards becoming the first African fighter to win the World Boxing Council's newly established bridgerweight is slowly becoming a reality for Kevin "Two Guns" Lerena.

Lerena ruled the cruiserweight division with an iron fist as the IBO champion and remains undefeated with six successful defences. He then moved up to the heavyweight category where he won the WBA Inter-Continental belt in 2022.

After making a successful defence in the same year, he met Daniel Dubois for the actual WBA belt, and he lost that fight by a third-round knock-out in December 2022. It was after that bout – where he dropped the big Englishman three times in round one – that Lerena moved down the bridgerweight, beneath the heavyweight and above cruiserweight, which was established in 2020.

On November 25 last year Lerena, who was given a top-five rating, won the interim belt to secure the right to challenge for the WBC bridgerweight world belt. The champion, Lukasz Rozanski, was scheduled to defend against Badou Jack at the end of last year but that bout never happened. Rozanksi from Poland is now officially scheduled to face Lawrence "The Sauce" Okolie on Friday, May 24, at the Podpromie Arena in Rzeszow, Poland.

Lerena, who lost a 10-rounder in the heavyweight division to Australian Justis Huni for the World Boxing Organisation (WBO) Global heavyweight belt on March 8 in Saudi Arabia, said: "The winner will defend against me either in September or October. For now I will be in action in Golden Gloves big tournament in Cape Town in July. But I might return to Saudi Arabia in July."

Lerena, whose loss to Huni was his third against 33 wins, has tipped Okolie to emerge victorious. "I think Okolie will win the fight," said the 31-year-old left-hander who is trained by former heavyweight fighter Peter "The Sniper" Smith.

"Okolie is a better boxer than Rozanski; he just needs to evade Rozanski's big punches. Okolie is a puncher in his own rights."