Eddie Hearn, promoter for IBF, IBO, WBA, WBO heavyweight champion Anthony Joshua, has responded to the recent statements from Top Rank's CEO Bob Arum, who promotes WBC champion Tyson Fury.
In a recent interview with BoxingScene.com, Arum expressed his frustrations with the ongoing negotiations to finalize a lucrative unification between Fury and Joshua.
Hearn received an $150 million site fee from Saudi Arabia, but Arum is not convinced until a binding agreement is received.
Unless the remaining issues are resolved in the near future, Arum threatened to move forward with a trilogy fight between Fury and former world champion Deontay Wilder.
“Maybe we’ll breathe some life into Wilder, and Fury will fight Wilder and Joshua will fight (WBO mandatory challenger Oleksandr) Usyk,” said Arum to BoxingScene.com.
“Eddie Hearn is busy trying to sell the London Bridge. Let me tell you – last time I talked to Eddie was early last week and he said he was going to have a signed agreement from the Saudis in 24 hours. Well, he’s a little late. Wouldn’t you be pessimistic if you haven’t heard from him or anybody for a week? We’re the promoter with Frank (Warren) of Fury and we haven’t heard from Eddie in a week.”
Hearn is not concerned with Arum's statements and highly doubts that there is any possibility of Team Fury walking away from their discussions to stage a trilogy fight with Wilder.
He believes the veteran promoter is simply applying additional pressure to get the full agreement over the finish line.
“Bob is trying to put pressure on, that’s how he works. He will think it’s a bit slow now, give an interview thinking it will speed up the Middle East. We don’t need to play that game, everybody’s on board, let’s just go through the process correctly,” Hearn told Mirror Fighting.
“Time is of the essence and if we got into a situation where the site agreement wasn’t signed in less than a week, we would have to start looking at things. But no-one has a plan B, which is a good sign. Bob may talk about Tyson fighting Wilder, but he ain’t going to fight Wilder, it’s a nothing fight. I don’t have other plans, normally I have plan A, B and C, but it’s all about this fight and it will happen.
“We have a situation where all the parties signed a contract. We went out and got a fantastic site deal and both fighters agreed to the financials, the site deal, everything. Now what is taking longer than expected is we’re back and forth just finalizing the long form site agreement. It’s frustrating because you look on social media and read comments like ‘what’s the hold-up? You’re a joke’.
“It’s not a case of that’ll do, just sign it. You’ve got Fury’s people, which is a team of about 40 people, you’ve got the site, you’ve got the broadcasters around it. It’s a massive deal, but we will get there. I won’t stop until we get it over the line. If it falls through, it won’t be any fault of ours and I don’t think it will. It’s too big, both guys want it too much, just got to keep pushing and pushing.”
