The biggest-possible fight in boxing could happen before anyone expected.
Tyson Fury and Anthony Joshua are in talks to stage a heavyweight title-unification bout in Saudi Arabia or elsewhere on the Arabian Peninsula when boxing resumes, meaning Deontay Wilder, due a rematch with Fury, presumably would have to be paid step-aside money.
No specific dates were reported by ESPN, which broke the news. However, The Athletic reported that organizers are targeting December.
MTK Global, a boxing management firm, reportedly is negotiating for Fury on behalf of his co-promoters Bob Arum and Frank Warren because of a rift between Warren and Joshua promoter Eddie Hearn. MTK is waiting for an offer from promoters in Saudi Arabia, according to ESPN.
Sources told ESPN that the offer would have to big enough to pay Fury and Joshua, as well as compensate Wilder to step aside.
One potential hitch in the plan: Sources told ESPN that Wilder and his handlers are aware of the Fury-Joshua talks, but Shelly Finkel, Wilder’s advisor, said that isn’t so. Wilder, who was stopped by Fury in February, has a contractual right to face him again.
“As far as we’re concerned, the next fight [for Wilder] is the third fight [with Fury],” Finkel told ESPN.
Another possible conflict: Joshua was scheduled to defend his titles against Kubrat Pulev on June 20 but that fight was postponed because of the coronavirus pandemic.
“We’re talking to MTK about where that fight would take place,” Hearn told ESPN. “At the moment, the main focus for everybody [is] the contractual situations.”
Hearn went on: “The conversations between myself and MTK are that we’ve had an approach. We’ve had a number of approaches from territories to stage that fight. So the only discussions at the moment are where this fight takes place. And we don’t even know when this fight could take place. … We’re certainly open to have discussions about the possibility of this happening this year or in the next fight.”
Arum said he’s in a waiting mode.
“Let’s see what type of offers we get from the Middle East,” he said, “because there is a real frenzy with Saudi Arabia, Qatar, with the Emirates, to do events, to open up these countries in the winter and into next year. It would be foolish for us to not consider those types of offers.”
Fury obviously is open to fighting anyone anywhere.
“I’ll fight in Timbuktu if the money’s right,” he said. “I have a bag, and I will travel.”