Dean Lonergan, promoter for WBO welterweight champion Jeff Horn, is not very happy with the new date for his boxer's mandatory defense against undefeated Terence Crawford.
The fight was initially scheduled to take place on April 14th at the T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas - but Crawford withdrew after suffering a minor hand injury in training camp.
Earlier this week, Top Rank officially announced the new date of June 9th at Las Vegas' MGM Grand.
The new date presents an issue for Horn and his promoter, and may cost them a lot of money in broadcasting revenue.
The fight was going to be on pay-per-view in Australia - but now there is a conflict because Main Event (Australia's main pay-per-view carrier) is already committed that night, as they are carrying Robert Whittaker’s first defense of his UFC middleweight title, which is the main event on UFC 225 in Chicago.
Because UFC 225 has already secured the PPV date, Horn’s bout can be shown only on Fox Sports, or on a commercial network.
It is being estimated that Horn and Lonergan, by missing out on their cut of Main Event revenue, will cost them more than $1 million.
Lonergan places the blame for the scenario on Crawford - as the Aussie promoter is not convinced that Crawford had a serious injury.
“It’s going to cost us quite a bit of money if we don’t get on there,” Lonergan said to The Australian.
“I have been appealing to Bob Arum and Top Rank to change the date. He doesn’t want to know about it. He has issues around the complexities of his deal with (US broadcaster) ESPN. They plan to heavily promote the fight and ticket sales during game four of the NBA finals. But that’s not helping us with pay-per-view down here.
“Yet again, Duco and Jeff Horn have to pay the price for that pussycat Terence Crawford. This is only going to add to the belting Terence Crawford is going to get. This all came about because Terence Crawford lost his nerve.
“If the pussy had hardened up, we wouldn’t be at this point. He’s soft.”