Cardiff, United Kingdom- Current WBC champion, Tyson Fury and two-time WBA, WBO and IBF champion, Anthony Joshua, are expected to touch gloves on the 3rd of December at the Principality Stadium.
Fury and Joshua looked set to meet last year when they were negotiating for an undisputed fight, but an arbitration panel ruled that Fury had to face Deontay Wilder for a third time instead.
After beating Whyte in April, Fury then said he was retiring and reiterated that claim last month, before challenging former world champion Joshua in a video posted on social media.
However, last week, Fury gave Joshua 24 hours to accept terms for a fight, offering him the short end of 60-40 on all takings for a fight on November 24 or December 3, with a rematch clause that would be on a 50-50 basis.
“258 and Matchroom Boxing can confirm, on behalf of Anthony Joshua, that we accepted all terms presented to us by Fury’s team for a fight Dec 3rd last Friday. Due to the Queen’s passing, it was agreed to halt all communication. We are awaiting a response,” read a tweet from 258 management, Joshua’s management company.
December 17 had been the date originally targeted for an undisputed world heavyweight title fight between Fury and Usyk, a fight that would be expected to take place in Saudi Arabia, but when Usyk said that he would not be ready to box this year, Fury made it clear that he wanted to box before the end of the year.
Joshua was beaten by Ukrainian, Oleksandr Usyk in their rematch in Saudi Arabia last month, his third defeat in his past five bouts.
Nevertheless, Joshua’s trainer Angel Fernandez is optimistic that he will definitely defeat Usyk if they ever get in the ring together again.
“If there’s a third fight against Usyk he will definitely beat him. I think he’s starting to understand a lot more things we just have to focus on ourselves. Rebuild AJ and hopefully down the line, the end of next year, we get to see Fury-AJ, we might get to see another fight against Usyk, we might see another fight against Andy Ruiz. So there are great fights out there for Anthony,” said Fernandez.
Joshua has boxed twice at the Principality Stadium, beating Carlos Takam and Joseph Parker in consecutive fights in 2017 and 2018.
