Listen Now:
By: Sean Crose
Anthony Joshua has agreed to terms for a massive December 3’d heavyweight title bout with Tyson Fury. “Joshua-Fury update:” 258MGT tweeted Tuesday morning, “258 and @MatchroomBoxing can confirm, on behalf of @anthonyjoshua, 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.” Should team Fury give the green light (as would be expected since it sent the original offer for a Fury-Joshua matchup), the negotiations will have moved ahead with alarming speed, especially in this snail-paced era of big fight negotiations.
WBC and lineal heavyweight champion Fury was originally looking to secure a match with Oleksandr Usyk for the undisputed heavyweight title. Team Usyk wasn’t interested in fighting so soon after a recent major fight and so Fury surprised a lot of people by reaching out – publicly – to Joshua for a match. Team Joshua nodded approvingly at what team Fury sent their way as far as a first offer and now, weeks later, the long awaited matchup between the two popular and towering Englishmen appears to be on the cusp of being signed into reality.
The irony, of course, is the fact it was Joshua who Usyk fought just last month. The Ukrainian won his second battle in a row against the Londoner that night, denying Joshua the opportunity to win back the belts Usyk had won from him nearly a year earlier. Team Joshua, however, is willing to forgo the period of rest a fighter usually has after a massive bout to jump into the fire against Fury this December. It might be a stroke of genius. Or madness. Or perhaps both. Either way, credit to Joshua and his team for accepting such an unusual offer.
As for Fury – he hasn’t responded to Joshua’s reported acceptance of his offer yet (one never knows the finer details in these situations), but if he does, he’ll clearly be the considerable favorite entering the ring this December. Not only is the man undefeated, he’s bested Deontay Wilder two out of three times (their first battle ended in a draw) and recently knocked Dillian Whyte into near oblivion with a thunderous fight ending shot last spring. Joshua, however, is clearly determined. Coupled with the fact that Fury is far physically and stylistically different than Usyk, it won’t be so easy to write Joshua off before the fight. Joshua certainly has power, after all, as well as incredible drive. A December 3’d matchup with Fury would in and of itself be one of the year’s bigger surprises. A Joshua win would be another one.
