Bradley Rea has announced that his fight with Constantino Nanga has been cancelled after Nanga picked up an injury during training.

At the time of writing, it doesn’t appear like a replacement opponent will be found for Rea.

The light heavyweight prospects had been due to meet in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia on February 22nd.

The undisputed light heavyweight rematch between champion, Artur Beterbiev, and Dmitry Bivol headlines the massive ‘The Last Crescendo’ event but Rea, 20-1 (10 KOs), and Sweden’s Nanga, 12-0 (8 KOs), and had been due to form part of a lengthy, talent packed undercard.

The event will be televised worldwide by DAZN.

Rea, 26, has worked long and hard to rebuild his profile after suffering an English middleweight title defeat to future European champion, Tyler Denny, back in November 2022.

Now competing at 175lbs, Manchester-born Rea has put together six successive victories on the small hall circuit and although a betting underdog for his fight with the Lennox Lewis-backed Nanga, he was extremely confident of recording a shock victory over the highly touted Swede and displaying his abilities on the biggest stage possible.

A heartbroken Rea announced the news on Instagram;

"Sick to my stomach typing this one out but unfortunately my fight on February 22nd in Saudi is off due to an injury to my opponent and unfortunately it doesn’t look like I’ll be getting a replacement or being kept on the card.

"After a brutal 6 weeks of training it’s heartbreaking being so close to the fight and it not going ahead after all the effort, time and money wasted during camp.

"I finally thought my luck had changed getting this call but it unfortunately wasn’t meant to be this time. Straight back into the gym on Monday and back to work preparing for the next opportunity that comes my way, whatever that might be.

"Hopefully @turkialalshik can get this fight matched up again in the future between me and @costasnanga as it was one me and lots of fans were looking forward to.

"Finally just want to say a big thank you to everyone who has supported me in the build up to the fight, especially my sponsors for the backing and belief and to those family and friends who have booked flight, hotels and tickets. People spending their hard earned money to follow and support me really means the world to me and I hope you can all get some kind of refund or go out and enjoy the event still without me."