By: Sean Crose
“Well, guys,” WBC and lineal heavyweight titlist Tyson Fury said on a Monday Instagram message, “it’s official. D-day has come and gone. It’s gone past 5 o’clock Monday. No contract has been signed.” Fury was referring, of course, to a potential December fight between himself and former heavyweight titlist Anthony Joshua. Fury had given Joshua until Monday to officially sign a contract for a December throwdown. Joshua and his team indicated they liked what they saw from the Fury camp, but that they needed more time to essentially sift through the fine print. “Of course, I’m going to sign a contract,” Joshua stated on social media. “It’s just with some lawyers at the minute.”
That apparently wasn’t good enough for Fury, who now says the high profile bout isn’t happening – at least not in December. “I always knew you didn’t have the minerals to fight the Gypsy King,” said Fury. “Good luck with your career, and your life.” Tough talk, to be sure, but it’s worth noting Joshua’s camp believe negotiations remain ongoing. The same, believe it or not, also applies to Fury’s co-promoter Frank Warren. “We’re trying to make it work,” Warren told talkSPORT, “and we had a good meeting today so we’ll see what happens.”
If there’s one thing to be said about the unpredictable Fury it’s that he’s always unpredictable. The undefeated titlist surprised a lot of people when, shortly after Joshua lost a rematch to Oleksandr Usyk late last summer, he offered to fight his fellow Englishman with a sixty/forty split of the purse. It seemed too good to be true, and perhaps it was. Still, Fury may decide to change his mind about the deadline should he learn that team Joshua is quite serious about meeting him in the ring in December.
A bout between Fury and Joshua has frankly been a long time coming. In fact, just last year the two Englishmen were set to fight in the Middle East. A judge’s ruling led to the highly anticipated bout falling through, however. Fury adhered to the judge’s ruling and battled Deontay Wilder for the third time in a terrific fight that saw Fury knock the hard hitting American out. Yet things didn’t go so well for Joshua, who ended up losing his heavyweight titles to Oleksandr Usyk. The Londoner has only fought once since that time – again against Usyk, who bested him again several weeks ago.
