The deep cuts on Vitali Klitschko’s face are filled of stitches and just beginning to heal. He won’t be able to fight again until late this year, at the earliest.

That didn’t stop Klitschko from beginning another fight Tuesday – to get Lennox Lewis back in the ring for a rematch both he and a lot of boxing fans believe he deserves.

“I want a rematch and the rematch would be much bigger (for Lewis) than Roy Jones,” Klitschko said.

Klitschko, who may have won a lot more than he lost in Saturday night’s fight, repeated his belief that the fight shouldn’t have been stopped at the end of the sixth round because of a bad cut over his left eye.

The cut was an inch deep, all the way to the bone, and took 60 stitches to close. But Klitschko said the ring doctor’s decision took away from what might have been a spectacular ending to the heavyweight title fight.

Klitschko was ahead on all three scorecards in a brutal if somewhat ungainly brawl at the Staples Center in Los Angeles when the fight was stopped because of the cut.

His lawyer, Ron DiNicola, said he is considering protesting the decision to the California Athletic Commission and asking the World Boxing Council to order a rematch.

Neither of those avenues are likely to get him a second fight with Lewis, who welcomed a rematch just after the fight but has another possibly lucrative fight with Jones that could get in the way.

Complicating the chances for a second fight is that Klitschko needs time to heal before beginning training again.

“Six months would be a good time,” said Dr. Pearlman Hicks, who sewed the cuts up. “We want to make sure it’s perfectly healed so he can get back in the ring and not worry about the problem.”

Hicks said the cut over the fighter’s eye took several layers of stitches to close. Another cut on his lip was cut to the muscle. Though Klitschko lost, he won over a lot of boxing fans and legitimized his claim to be a top heavyweight.

contender. He put himself in the mix among a handful of top heavyweights, with the possibilities of big fights other than Lewis.

“I don’t want to fight everyone. I want to fight for a world championship,” Klitschko said. “It is my dream to fight world champions.”

Klitschko is from Ukraine, but he and his brother, Wladimir, both speak German and spent the last six years fighting and building up a big fan base in Germany.

The fight started at around 4:30 a.m. in Germany because of the time difference, but a whopping 4.6 million either stayed up or crawled out of bed to watch. The numbers were similar to what a popular prime time show in the country draws.

Some said it was the first time in 20 years it was worth sitting up all night to watch boxing – since Muhammad Ali was fighting.

“We’re staying awake again. The drama in Los Angeles wouldn’t let us sleep, just like we once couldn’t with the ‘Thrilla in Manila’ and the “Rumble in the Jungle,” wrote the Berliner Morgenpost, a daily.

AP-ES-06-24-03 1635EDT