Emanuele Blandamura, Fabio Turchi return July 11 in Rome

Veteran Emanuele Blandamura will move from middleweight to super middleweight, and rising cruiserweight Fabio Turchi will return on a July 11 card from Rome, which will air on DAZN.

Blandamura (29-3, 5 KO) will take on Marcus Morrison (20-3, 14 KO) for a minor WBC super middleweight title in the main event. Blandamura, 39, has been a pro since 2007. He fought twice for the European middleweight title, losing via knockout to Billy Joe Saunders in2014 and again via knockout to Michel Soro in 2015.

After those losses, he finally won the European title via split decision in Dec. 2016, beating Matteo Signani to win the vacant belt. He defended it once against Alessandro Goddi, then went to Japan where he was stopped in eight by WBA “world” titleholder Ryota Murata in April 2018.

Blanadmura has won a couple easy fights since then, beating opponents with incoming records of 7-11-2 and 16-40.

Morrison, 28, turned pro in 2014, and the Manchester native has frankly never done much. His biggest fight came in March 2017, where he dropped Jason Welborn early but ultimately lost the 10-round decision. He was then shocked in a four-round return bout, losing on points to club fighter Tyan Booth (who was 11-11-5), and he lost to Alistair Warren (who was 10-18-4) on points over eight in June 2018. Morrison has currently won four straight, but the opponents combined for records of 19-133-1.

Turchi (17-0, 13 KO) is a 25-year-old from Florence, Italy, a southpaw who has been impressive against the level of opposition he’s had, including decent wins in his last two over Tony Conquest and Sami Enbom.

He’ll be facing Tommy McCarthy (14-2, 7 KO), which is pretty much a sideways step. The 28-year-old McCarthy, born in London and based in Belfast, has beaten Jon-Lewis Dickinson and Courtney Fry, but otherwise just journeymen and professional opponents. He lost a decision to Matty Askin in Nov. 2016, and a TKO-4 to Richard Riakporhe in March of this year.