The Ring has learned Australia’s Opetaia is holding out hope that the IBF will change its stance at the 11th hour and sanction the Glanton bout because his ultimate goal remains to become undisputed champion, which would require the undefeated southpaw to hold on to his IBF belt.

Opetaia paid a sanctioning fee in excess of $80,000 in advance to the IBF. His new promoter, Zuffa Boxing, also provided the IBF’s supervisor with a hotel suite in Las Vegas for fight week, a customary practice when sanctioning organizations oversee championship matches.

It is unclear why the IBF changed its position so close to fight night on allowing Opetaia to fight for its title, along with The Ring and Zuffa Boxing belts. The IBF indicated in its abovementioned statement that because it doesn’t recognize Zuffa Boxing as a sanctioning organization in its bylaws that it would not sanction Opetaia-Glanton as a unification fight and would therefore strip Opetaia of its title.

Opetaia’s IBF and Ring championships were displayed on stage during their final press conference Friday night at MGM Grand, as was the Zuffa Boxing belt.

Zuffa Boxing continued to support Opetaia’s position Saturday and still planned to move forward with an IBF-mandated second-day weigh-in Sunday morning.

The IBF is the only one of boxing’s four major governing bodies that requires second-day weigh-ins, which prohibit champions and challengers from gaining more than 10 pounds above a division’s limit a day after fighters weigh in. In this case, neither Opetaia nor Glanton would be allowed to weigh more than 210 pounds Sunday morning if the IBF were to reverse course and sanction their bout.

The IBF supervisor assigned to the Opetaia-Glanton fight did not attend their weigh-in Saturday morning.

Opetaia (29-0, 23 KOs) expressed to at least part of Zuffa Boxing’s leadership group, which includes Ring owner Turki Alalshikh, when he signed with the upstart promotional company that he wants to keep his IBF title and continue to pursue the WBA, WBC and WBO belts. Zuffa Boxing’s decision-makers ultimately want their belts to be recognized as the belts in boxing, but accepted Opetaia’s position on becoming a fully unified champion.

Regardless, he will defend his Ring title for the eighth time against Atlanta’s Glanton (21-3, 18 KOs) and they will fight for the first Zuffa Boxing belt in any division in a 12-round main event Paramount+ will stream from Meta Apex, UFC’s performance complex in Las Vegas.

Main undercard coverage is scheduled to start Sunday on Paramount+ at 6 p.m. PT (9 p.m. ET).

Keith Idec is a senior writer and columnist for The Ring. He can be reached on X @idecboxing.