Eddie Hearn says that an announcement over a fight between Anthony Joshua and Tyson Fury is “days away” and has suggested it might be possible for the fight to take place in Las Vegas.
Fury gave an interview this week appearing quite downcast about the prospects of the undisputed world heavyweight title fight happening this summer, but Hearn says things are still on track and discussions over a site have already begun.
“I think we are days away,” Hearn said. “I know I have said that two and five weeks ago, but we are days away from giving everyone some good news.
“Bob Arum has said the contract is agreed and that is correct, it goes around now for everyone’s signature, so we are nearly there. The next process, which has been on-going for a couple of weeks, is securing the venue and the site deal and that is progressing well.
“We want to make the fight in June or early July because we want to do two this year.”
While Saudi Arabia, where Joshua beat Andy Ruiz Jr in 2019, has generally been seen as the most likely venue, Hearn insists that six or seven options are on the table. These include the United States, China, Singapore, other nations in the Middle East and the UK, although the last seems unlikely.
“If it wasn’t our homeland then we wouldn’t bother [considering it],” Hearn said. “The only way we could possibly do it in the UK is if we are guaranteed if we can get 100,000 people in Wembley and that seems almost impossible.
“America has opened up as an option, we are in talks with Jerry Jones and the Dallas Cowboys about having 70,000 for Canelo-Saunders.
“And I believe Las Vegas is close to opening up to 50 percent capacity, could they have 100 percent by July?
“If they could, they could be a player and they will need something monstrous to bring people back.”
Hearn said he had no idea why Fury might be doubtful about the fight going ahead, although he pointed out that he is not on Fury’s side of the negotiations.
"I don’t think he’s aware of what’s happening,” Hearn said. “There hasn’t really been a delay from our side. The communication lines have been open the whole time.
“People have thought ‘oh, it’s going to slip away’. It’s just that there are more people in their team than our team and things take a little bit longer because of the interval dynamics.
“I’ve spoken to their team, everyone is happy, everyone is ready to move forward and, as I say, originally we were going to begin negotiations with the sites once the deal was done, but because of the timeframe, we started doing that two weeks ago, so we’re already quite advanced.
“Now it’s our job collectively with the two teams to go out and present the options and the sites to the two fighters for them to agree which one to take.”
He said that he expected the first announcement from the two fighters will merely confirm the deal has been signed, with a venue and date announced later.
“If we are going to deliver this fight late June, early July at the latest, we need to get that moving,” he said. “That’s why we took the decision to start those conversations a couple of weeks ago, so we have a number of phone calls to move forward with the finalising of site offers.
“There will be at least half a dozen offers to stage this fight, which we will have to present to our client and Top Rank will have to present to their client, and ask which one would you like to move forward with?
“The world is going to open up very quickly in May, June and July. People want to scream from the roof tops that they're open and staging one of the biggest events in the world of sport is a great opportunity for them.
“Although some people want to be pessimistic about a fight happening or site deals while we are very optimistic and we want to give you the process of what is happening. It's very, very positive to have all parties put pen to paper.”
But Hearn said the fight going ahead ultimately comes down to Fury signing the contract.
“I would like to believe Tyson Fury wants to fight Anthony Joshua,” Hearn said. “What I would like to hear from him is 'The only fight I want is Anthony Joshua' because that is how we feel.
“The only fight that AJ wants is Tyson Fury. Although they are going to put pen to paper, the interview was a bit disappointing because I want to hear him say 'This is it for boxing, the only fight I'm interested in is Anthony Joshua'.
“I don't know whether he was in a bad mood or pulling everyone's plonker. What I do know is everyone has put a lot of work into this deal and he is on board.”
Ron Lewis is a senior writer for BoxingScene. He was Boxing Correspondent for The Times, where he worked from 2001-2019 - covering four Olympic Games and numerous world title fights across the globe. He has written about boxing for a wide variety of publications worldwide since the 1980s.