- Tyson Fury said on his YouTube channel there is only a “one per cent” chance his December 11 fight with Anthony Joshua at Cardiff’s Principality Stadium actually happens
- Dana White said “the guy who’s supposed to be helping the fight has been hurting the fight the entire time,” a clear dig at promoter Eddie Hearn
- The bout is for the vacant WBA Super heavyweight title and was only officially confirmed on September 25 after fifteen years of on-off talks
Fury Doesn't Believe His Own Fight Is Happening
Right then. Tyson Fury has gone on his own YouTube channel and rated the chances of his own fight happening at one per cent, and when the man in the fight is that sceptical, the rest of us are allowed to be too. "If you've got a guy that wants to fight, yeah, and you've got a guy that doesn't want to fight, then how are you going to make that fight happen?" Fury said, and make no mistake, that is not a throwaway line from a fighter who has spent fifteen years watching this exact fight collapse.
The bit that will worry Joshua fans more is the pattern Fury pointed to next. "Every time it comes to fighting [Joshua]... it never happens," he said, and he is not wrong. This is a fight that has died more deaths than any domestic showdown in British boxing history. The only reason anyone is still paying attention this time is the December 11 date at Cardiff's Principality Stadium and the vacant WBA Super heavyweight title that comes with it, both of which were only officially confirmed on September 25.
Dana White Points The Finger Straight At Hearn
This is where it gets properly interesting. Dana White, who is promoting the fight alongside Netflix, did not hold back when he was asked about the delays. "The guy who's supposed to be helping the fight has been hurting the fight the entire time," White said, and there is only one promoter in this deal who fits that description. Eddie Hearn has disputed how much say White actually has in running this event, and that turf war is now spilling out into public view a little over two months before the two are supposed to share a ring walk.
White would only say "we'll all know more in the next three or four days," which if you know boxing, you know is the sort of line promoters use when they genuinely do not know either. Fury, to his credit, did leave himself an escape hatch on his own scepticism. "I do think it'll happen. Because from what I'm hearing, they've been paid already," he added. Class piece of British boxing logic there — the money has moved, so eventually the fighters follow it.
The Verdict
Let's not beat around the bush. This has been the most cursed fight in the sport for a decade and a half, and a bit of pre-fight friction between the promoters was always going to arrive eventually. I don't think Fury's one per cent number is remotely literal — that is a heavyweight enjoying himself in front of a camera — but the Hearn-White tension is real, and it is exactly the kind of thing that has killed this fight before. My prediction: it happens, because too much money and too much Netflix promotion is already committed to pull the plug now. But if you know boxing, you know not to book the day off work just yet.