By Edward Chaykovsky
Promoter Eddie Hearn has rejected Top Rank's offer to have WBO lightweight champion Ricky Burns travel to the United States to face mandatory challenger Terrence Crawford on January 25th at Madison Square Garden in New York City. A few days ago, Top Rank's CEO Bob Arum told BoxingScene.com that he would like to stage Burns-Crawford on the date of Jan. 25th in MSG.
Last month Burns won a controversial decision over Ray Beltran to retain the belt. During the match he suffered a broken jaw and Hearns points out that his boxer will not be 100% to fight until the middle of February.
Once Burns is ready to fight, then Hearn wants to match Burns against Beltran in a rematch to set the record straight - and then match Burns against Crawford at a later date.
Besides that, Hearn says the offer for Burns-Crawford was very low and he appears confident in beating Top Rank should the situation head to a purse bid.
Hearn told The Scotsman: “Crawford is with Top Rank, the same as Beltran, and we have already written to Arum to say that we accept that Beltran probably won and we think he should be given a rematch as it’s the right thing to do, morally as much as anything. But Crawford will be on to Top Rank saying that he is next in line and as they probably have more interest in him than they do Beltran, they’ll try to force the situation.
“But, for me, commercially Beltran is a bigger fight and more relevant and we are liaising with the broadcaster HBO in an effort to try to make a rematch. I was interested to learn that Bob Arum announced that Burns will fight Crawford on January 25 which was very nice of him. He did make us an offer which we have rejected, and, because of the purse bid split, we would be favorites to get that fight for Scotland anyway.
“Sometimes you get an offer you really can’t turn down. But it’s my job to ensure that if Ricky fights in America the money is life-changing and the offer we got is nowhere near that.”