Former unified super middleweight world champion Mikkel Kessler had been flirting with the possibility of coming out of retirement, but he appears to have shut down any comeback talks.
Kessler spoke to BT and simply said, “I'll stop, it's over now" when it came to his potential comeback.
The former world champion said last year that he would be planning to come out of retirement and has reportedly looked good in sparring sessions with then-unbeaten super middleweight contender Erik Skoglund.
Starting his pro career in 1998, Kessler held the WBA super middleweight title on three separate occasions and became the unified WBA and WBC super middleweight champion for 13 months from 2006 to 2007. All three of Kessler’s WBA super middleweight title reigns ended with losses to Joe Calzaghe in 2007, Andre Ward in 2009 and Carl Froch in 2013 in what ended up being Kessler’s final fight before retiring.
Kessler’s return fight was supposed to take place last November but he withdrew from the fight after it was revealed that he was suffering from Lyme Disease and he was out with illness for a few months. Since then, Kessler told BT he couldn’t continue through with his plans to come out of retirement.
"I just can´t find the motivation to go through with it all," Kessler said.
The 38-year-old Kessler started his career as a middleweight and junior middleweight before finding world title success as a super middleweight. Kessler was part of the original Super Six boxing tournament roster before withdrawing from the tournament with an eye injury.
