Manager is willing to bet on his man Friday

FRIDAY AHUNANYA is being paid just $35,000 to fight David Tua in March – but his manager is willing to stake three times that amount that Tua can't knock his man out.

In an inspired piece of early pre-fight posturing, Luis Tapia has tried unsuccessfully to lay down a $100,000 bet with Tua (who has 43 of 50 wins by knockout) that no matter the result, he won't be the first man to KO the 38-year-old Nigerian.

Tapia, who considers himself a serious poker player and regularly punts on boxing, said he'd asked Tua to stand by earlier comments that he would KO his man – but claimed Tua told him he was misquoted and had only predicted he would win.

"So I couldn't propose the deal right then ... but if he confirms it to me or anyone else, I will put a lot of money down. I don't think he's got too much money, but I don't want to give him shit about that – David's a real nice guy," Tapia told the Sunday Star-Times. "There are lots of things happen in a fight, but I will guarantee and put any money on the line that he won't knock out Friday. He's never been knocked out."

If Tua declines the offer, then Tapia says he will heavily back his charge, a solid but unspectacular 24-5-3 fighter, at the bookies before the fight (set for somewhere between March 24 and 27), and was quick to ask how New Zealand's betting system worked. "I like to gamble," he said. "But I make money on it."

Tapia, whose chatter may flog plenty of tickets for promoter Duco, says he bases his confidence on Lennox Lewis' 2001 defeat of Tua, saying: "Lewis made him look like a clown."

In a sign that Ahunanya's fight plan will be to take Tua the distance, Tapia said he had a contractual clause stipulating overseas judges be selected.

He'll have to wait to put down any cash, with TAB odds maker Mark Stafford saying he wouldn't compile a book until a few weeks before the fight and warning that to make big money, Tapia would need to predict not just a result, but how it happened: those who won big on Tua v Cameron had tipped the right round for Cameron's demise. That fight was the TAB's fourth-biggest single punting event, said Stafford: "It was incredible, considering neither was that highly-ranked and there were no big titles up – we always knew it would be big, but never that big."

Ahununya's tiny purse explains how Duco will attempt to make the March fight profitable despite Maori TV's minimalist television contract.

Ahununya used to make a good living as the sparring partner to the stars, working with Mike Tyson, Lennox Lewis, Samuel Peter, Ruslan Chagaev, Wladimir Klitschko and even Tua, and Tapia said his last job, in January 2007 with Klitschko, was worth $250 per round, four rounds a day, four days a week, but he called a halt because sparring work "kills the aggression".

The maths don't make as much sense since: Ahununya's only bout was in June 2008, a 10-round points decision over Alonzo Butler, which Tapia ascribed to a contractual dispute with a promoter and he earned a crust working in the office of a sponsors' transport company. "Now he feels better, he feels strong and he has the love for the sport again, which is important," Tapia said.

- © Fairfax NZ News