While the blame game is in full swing over Tyson Fury’s fractured talks with Oleksandr Usyk for their undisputed heavyweight title bout, with most joining Usyk and his team in pointing the finger directly at Fury, the British champ is now eyeing a fight with fellow Brit Anthony Joshua, according to the latter’s promoter.
The April 29 Wembley showpiece event fell over despite Usyk, the WBA, WBO and IBF champion, accepting Fury’s terms, notably a 70-30 split of earnings in favour of Fury, the WBC titleholder.
However, they reportedly couldn’t agree on a split if the loser invokes a rematch clause and there were also disagreements on several other elements, from hotels to flights.
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They were given a deadline of April 1 by the WBA to officially agree to a deal, otherwise Usyk would be ordered to undertake a mandatory title defence.
Another twist in the narrative has seen Anthony Joshua’s promoter Eddie Hearn suggest Fury could face his fighter if Joshua wins his fight against Jermaine Franklin this weekend.
“I have had talks this week with George Warren and fundamentally the original contract is still in place and we all know that the timing is perfect now, as it happens because of the circumstances with Usyk,” Hearn told The Daily Mail.
“This is the very last chance for this huge fight to happen. I expect to be exchanging pilot contracts with Queensberry soon. Maybe as early as next week. AJ knows there’s a big opportunity. At last. So much at stake now, but he also has his total focus on Franklin.”
Joshua agreed with his promoter, telling reporters: “There’s no better time! I feel like now with Fury, provided the Usyk fight doesn’t happen and he doesn’t fight anyone in between, I think he needs me at the minute. He’s been a great champion, he’s given us a lot of entertaining commentary and fights with Deontay Wilder.
“We’ve tried to make that fight three times,” Joshua added. “That [second one] was signed and sealed, I was actually training for that and then it fell through. Then we had this recent one where I just lost and he gave me a deadline. I took it and told Eddie ‘Let’s look at the situation’ but it was difficult when someone is dictating you and put you under that amount of pressure but I understand his frustration.”
Although, Fury’s promoter Frank Warren, said Hearn’s comments were “bollocks” and that the two parties had only spoken for “30 seconds”.
“George rang Hearn and said, ‘What’s this all about?’ He said he was unaware of it. I’m just telling you what he said,” he told TalkSport.
“George said it was less than a 30-second conversation and we’ve not even discussed it with Tyson.
“Really annoyed about that because that 100 per cent did not happen. “Contracts are gonna be signed in the next week”, it’s just absolute bollocks.”
Fury and Joshua were scheduled to meet in an undisputed clash two years ago, but the fight was abandoned after Deontay Wilder secured a third fight with Fury after arbitration. Joshua then lost his belts to Usyk later that year whilst Fury knocked out Wilder for the second time.
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Fury’s hardball tactics within negotiations are well known in boxing circles but former world champion and ESPN pundit Tim Bradley blamed the Brit for the fight falling through.
“We wanna see an undisputed heavyweight championship fight, that’s what we wanna see Tyson Fury, and did he get that house already in August? Did he get it already? Because I will call a legitimate duck by Tyson Fury. He’s ducking Usyk,” Bradley said.
“He didn’t even think that Usyk was going to take the 70/30 split Usyk was adamant to take a 50/50 split, he wanted 50/50, didn’t even take 60/40 and then you have Fury come in and say 70/30. Usyk and his team said ‘we’ll do it’, and then the goalposts got moved again and it continues to get moved.”
Former champion Wilder also said he is interested in facing Usyk. Wilder is the WBC’s No.1 contender, meaning he could also fight Fury for a fourth time if Fury agrees.
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