An injury to a knuckle on his left hand has forced middleweight champion Kelly Pavlik to postpone his title defense against highly ranked Paul Williams.

A news conference on Tuesday to announce the bout, which originally had been set for Oct. 3 in Atlantic City, was also postponed.

The earliest Pavlik would be able to return for a rescheduled fight is Nov. 21, though it could end up with an early-December date.

Pavlik, who is 35-1 with 31 knockouts, informed Top Rank chairman Bob Arum of the injury on Monday.

He was scheduled to face the toughest test in his career in Williams, a lanky punching machine who is ranked third in the Yahoo! Sports poll of the world’s finest boxers.

Williams is coming off a rout of Winky Wright.