World 100m record holder Asafa Powell will take on Olympic champion Justin Gatlin in a sprint showdown at the Golden League meet in Rome on 8 July. Powell, 22, clocked 9.77 seconds in Athens on 14 June and beat the previous best by 100th of a second to become the fastest man ever over the distance.
The Jamaican will also take on Gatlin's fellow American Shawn Crawford, who won the 200m gold at the last Olympics.
World champion Kim Collins is also in a high-calibre line-up.
The meet comes just a month prior to the World Championships in
Helsinki for which Gatlin and Crawford are currently trying to qualify for through the USA trials in Carson, California.
Powell and Gatlin met in the Prefontaine Classic in Oregon earlier this month where both clocked 9.84 but Gatlin was declared the winner.
MMIX
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