All is not lost for Shakhram Giyasov.

The Ring has learned that a slot will be reserved for the unbeaten Uzbek on the April 12 Jaron ‘Boots’ Ennis-Eimantas Stanionis undercard in Atlantic City, New Jersey. Giyasov (16-0, 9 KOs) will be afforded a stay-busy fight as a consolation for standing down from his current WBA mandatory challenger position.

The concession allowed Lithuania’s Stanionis (15-0, 9 KOs; 1 No Contest) to instead risk his WBA welterweight title against IBF titlist Jaron ‘Boots’ Ennis (33-0, 29 KOs; 1 No Contest). The bout will also come with The Ring welterweight championship; Ennis is The Ring’s No. 1 welterweight, while Stanionis is No. 2.

Neither an opponent nor the stakes were revealed for Giyasov’s placement on the show. It was theorized that the WBA would make available an interim title, but The Ring was unable to confirm that detail as this goes to publication.

For now, Giyasov—The Ring’s No. 7 welterweight and a 2016 Olympic Silver medalist—will fight with the assurance that he is next in line to challenge for the full WBA title.

“The World Boxing Association (WBA) Championships Committee approved special permission for the welterweight champion Eimantas Stanionis to unify his title against IBF champion Jaron Ennis on April 12 in Atlantic City,” the sanctioning body confirmed on Thursday. “The companies TGB Promotions and Matchroom Boxing, representatives of both fighters, sent the formal request to the WBA.

“In turn, as the regulations indicate, the pioneer body informed about this request to the team of Stanionis’ mandatory challenger, Shakhram Giyasov, who agreed that the fight between Stanionis and Ennis will take place. As determined by the championships committee and under the rules, the winner of the bout between Stanionis and Ennis will have to face Giyasov in a period not exceeding 120 days after they fight.”

The claim falls well short of a full-blown threat to the Ennis-Stanionis winner. It was widely reported that Ennis—with a win on April 12—was being groomed to return in October against The Ring/WBO junior welterweight champion Teofimo Lopez (21-1, 13 KOs).

That would leave Giyasov out in the cold, though an interim title fight prior to then would at least provide him with an insurance policy.

Stanionis and Giyasov were first ordered to enter negotiations last Sept. 19. The two sides failed to reach a deal within the assigned deadline, at which point the WBA scheduled a Nov. 8 purse bid hearing.

An agreement was eventually reached between all parties, at the time suggesting that an actual fight would take place.

Instead, Stanionis was being steered towards Ennis, who only wants unification bouts for as long as he plans to stick around at welterweight.

Stanionis won a secondary version of the WBA welterweight title in an April 2022 points win over Radzhab Butaev. Just one defense followed, a twelve-round, unanimous decision over Gabriel Maestre last May 4 at T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas.

An empty 2023 campaign was entirely attributed to a pair of canceled fight dates with Vergil Ortiz Jr. (22-0, 21 KOs), who ultimately moved up to junior middleweight. He was upgraded to full titlist last summer after Terence Crawford (41-0, 31 KOs) relinquished The Ring and his undisputed welterweight championship, belt by belt, to instead campaign at junior middleweight.

Ennis was similarly upgraded from interim to full IBF titleholder when Crawford refused to honor an ordered mandatory title defense during the second half of 2023.

Giyasov became the WBA mandatory after a June 2023 unanimous decision win over then-unbeaten Harold Calderon in New Orleans, Louisiana. He has since added two wins, including a ten-round, split decision over Mexico’s Miguel Parra last July 31 in Santa Monica, California.

The placement on the Ennis-Stanionis undercard comes through Giyasov’s relationship with Matchroom Boxing, who also promotes Ennis.

Jake Donovan is part of the U.S. team for The Ring. Follow Jake on X and Instagram.