By Igor Lazorin, tass

The legal battle between heavyweights Deontay Wilder and Alexander Povetkin is heading to a jury, according to attorney Alexei Karpenko, who is representing the interests of Povetkin and his promoter Andrei Ryabinsky of World of Boxing.

"The jury will begin hearing this case on Monday and it should last until Thursday or Friday,"  he said.

There are two lawsuits stemming from the failed fight  between Wilder and Povetkin, which was scheduled to take place last May in Moscow, Russia. Ryabinsky secured the promotional rights last February with a winning purse bid of $7.15 million. Wilder was guaranteed to make $4.5 million, while Povetkin will receive $1.93 million. The winner would have receivedt the remaining $715,000 placed by the WBC in escrow.

One week before the boxers were scheduled to face each other, the fight fell apart after Povetkin came up positive for banned substance meldonium. The substance became illegal on January 1, 2016. Povetkin claimed to have used it in the fall of 2015. The WBC conducted an investigation and found no evidence that Povetkin intentionally doped.

Wilder and his promoter, Lou DiBella, filed a lawsuit in the Federal District Court of the Southern District of New York - for the money they were owed from the cancelled fight. Ryabinsky and Povetkin counter-sued for $34.5 million, claiming a breach of contract among other items.

Povetkin is back in the hot seat, after failing another drug test last December, when he came up positive for banned substance ostarine. That failure caused another scheduled fight to crumble on late notice, when the WBC refused to sanction his fight with Bermane Stiverne as a final eliminator. Earlier this week Povetkin was removed from the WBC's rankings when his B-sample came back positive for ostarine.