Tyson Fury has sent a 'make or break' warning to Anthony Joshua as he threatens to walk away from their heavyweight fight. The pair agreed separate contracts to fight each other back in April, just days after Fury's comeback win over Arslanbek Makhmudov.
Warm-up bouts completed
Fury, 38, and Joshua, 36, were first required to get through respective warm-up bouts. The 'Gypsy King' stopped Mariusz Wach, while Joshua scored a second round knockout over Kristian Prenga. Since then, no official venue or date for the fight has been announced.
Joshua's deal included the stipulation that the showcase must be held at Wembley in the UK. However, Netflix and the Saudi Arabian backers who are paying for the contest - which is pencilled in for November 20 - want it to be moved to New York.
Fury's Instagram statement
Recently, it emerged that Fury would walk away from the all-British clash if an agreement had not been made by the end of this week. The 'Gypsy King' - who is currently training in Miami - doubled down on those claims and is open to moving on, as he bids to stay active in the ring.
In a post uploaded to Instagram, he said: "Quick update on what’s not happening. I am seeing Eddie (Hearn) doing a lot of interviews, trying to twist the narrative. The facts are… you do not want the fight. Because if you did, you would be ready to rock and roll like I am. Tyson Fury has already said a thousand times that he will fight anywhere. No problem at all."
He added: "Banging on about England, but he moved to Monaco and the other freak's moved to Dubai. It’s not about England so much then is it boys? Turki has paid you tens of millions to fight and you are still acting like little b******. It is what it is. There is nothing I can do. I cannot make a coward fight. At the end of the day, you have shown your true colours. If AJ was any sort of man, he would overrule the sausage. And he would stand up and fight, but obviously he is not and that is where we are."
Fury continued: "So, good luck to yous. And one thing for sure is, I won’t wait for a sausage who has been knocked spark out by Daniel Dubois. I have waited ten years for this and I have been ready every time. One thing I will not be doing is wasting my later years at 38 years old for a freak who does not want to fight. I will move on and there’s plenty of world champions out there who do want to fight and do want to make some money, so I will be giving them a knock. So there is plenty of men."
Potential opponents and contract status
He named potential opponents, saying: "Agit Kabayel, Filip Hrgovic, Daniel Dubois - whoever else there is. They are all very brave men and they are all looking for a few quid. Maybe I will give them and a call and they can fight me in November because this is going nowhere. As always, ten years later, still in the same boat. Still nowhere. Still dragging on."
On Wednesday morning, promoter Frank Warren revealed to reporters, including Mirror Fighting, that Fury has signed the contract for the fight, while Joshua's signature remains overdue. "The latest is Joshua's not signed yet," he said.
Warren added: "It's not for me to give him [a deadline], it's the people who are paying the money. It's all this stuff, as I said from the beginning, it's about contracts. I know what the contracts say. The contracts have all got to be amended. And it's about people… Tyson's signed. Tyson's done. He don't care when the fight takes place. They want it in New York, they want it in Barbados, they want it on the Isle of Wight. He's signed. He's done."
He explained: "He signed for the fight in January. And the fight's supposed to take place in September, but what happened with AJ and his accident, that all got pushed back. And where we got to with it was obviously AJ had his fight back, late, and we'd already had that one in December with Jake Paul. Then he had another fight back with that MMA guy, struggled in that. And then, it was decided to put it on in November. But one contract says one venue, the other contract says another venue, and the TV contract says another venue."
