Fury says negotiations still on for Joshua fight

Days after calling off the fight against former heavyweight champion, Anthony Joshua, Tyson Fury has revealed that he extended the negotiation timeframe to Thursday, hoping for Joshua’s team to do the needful. Fury initially said the fight was over on Monday, citing the failure of Joshua’s team to sign the contract in time. But it seems he had a change of heart as he revealed on Thursday that negotiations were still on. 

Taking to his social media page on Thursday, Fury revealed that it was his promoter, Frank Warren, that asked him to allow the negotiations to go on for a couple of days, which he obliged, even when he knew that Joshua would not still sign the contract. 

He said: “So the deadline was Monday. I allowed Frank to continue doing meetings with your team and your broadcasters and all that. Now we have BT, DAZN, and ESPN all on the same page. They are happy with everything, and they are all ready to rock and roll.

“You guys ask for a lot of stuff; you want to be co-promoters when you’re a voluntary challenger. Guess what? I said give it to them, let them be co-promoters.

“You wanted full transparency, even though you’re not an equal shareholder in this party. You know what I said? Give them full transparency. I’ve got nothing to hide. I’m not trying to rob anybody. I’ve not robbed anybody of a penny in my life. 

“So now you’ve got full transparency; everything is clean and fair. Now, Joshua, the ball is really in your court, son.”

Previously, Joshua had said that he was going to sign the contract, but he was running it through his lawyers first. Joshua’s promoter, Eddie Hearn, said that he was baffled at the situation. He accused Fury of setting unrealistic deadlines and said that Fury had been offering the same fight to other heavyweight fighters and is currently unsure if Fury truly wants the fight to proceed at all.  

From the looks of things, we may never get that fight, which is not so disappointing as nobody Exocet it before. Instead, we should be hoping for Fury vs. Usyk, which is expected to hold next year.