The Brit announced his retirement last month, but has since been tipped to go head-to-head with Anthony Joshua in the ring at some point this year
Boxing promoter Eddie Hearn is willing to give Tyson Fury an ultimatum regarding an all-British showdown with Anthony Joshua.
Last month, the ‘Gypsy King’ shocked the boxing world after announcing his retirement from the sport. In a video uploaded to social media, he said: “Hi everybody, I’m going to make this short and sweet. I’d like to announce my retirement from boxing. It’s been a blast, I’ve loved every single minute of it. I’m going to end with this. Dick Turpin wore a mask. God bless everybody, see you on the other side. Get up!”
His announcement came just weeks after suffering his second defeat to Oleksandr Usyk. The news served as a huge blow to Joshua – who had hoped to one day settle his rivalry with Fury. The pair have been tipped to fight for years, and it certainly looked on the cards after the ‘Gypsy King’ lost to the Ukrainian back in December.
Whilst a bout has never materialised, the Matchroom Boxing supremo is itching to get Fury out of retirement in an attempt to make the blockbuster clash. In an interview with IFL TV, he said: “Maybe there’s a conversation in a week or two weeks or three weeks’ time where we say to Fury, ‘just to let you know, you don’t wanna fight AJ, in the summer, or August, September, because if you want to come out of retirement, now is the time to do it’.”
He added: “The only things I know are AJ wants to fight Fury and he wants to fight for the world heavyweight title, that’s it.” Joshua’s career is at a crossroads after losing to British rival Daniel Dubois at Wembley back in September. On the topic of his star client, Hearn revealed ‘AJ’ has ‘two fights, three fights max’ left before retirement.
Hearn was speaking passionately about Joshua during an interview with talkSPORT on Thursday. “The plan and the goal for Anthony Joshua, always, from now to the moment he retires, is to try and win the World Heavyweight Championship,” he said. “To try and become a three-time World Heavyweight Champion.
“So, of course, the other fight, which we know at the moment is not available, is Tyson Fury, he wanted that fight. But, if you said to AJ, ‘what do you want to do most next?’ He would say, ‘I want to fight the winner of Dubois/Parker. I want another shot at a World Heavyweight title.’
“That’s a natural thing. You know, you’ve got [Martin] Bakole, you’ve got [Deontay] Wilder, you’ve got the winner of [Agit] Kabayel against [Zhilei] Zhang. They’re all possible fights, but, you know, you keep hearing about, ‘oh, AJ won’t fight this guy, won’t fight that guy.’ Come on, look at his resume.
“Like, when he boxed Oleksandr Usyk, he gave Usyk the shot at the World Heavyweight Championship. And everyone said to me, ‘oh, don’t fight Usyk, don’t fight Usyk’. It’s never my say. AJ wants to fight the best, he wants to challenge himself, and he wants to try and become undisputed, so he had to take care of his mandatory.
“He gave Usyk the shot at the kingdom. And he beat AJ, and then everyone went, ‘whatever you do, don’t rematch Usyk.’ And he rematched Usyk. You know, when he got stopped by Andy Ruiz, everyone went, ‘whoa, his confidence is shot to pieces, do not go straight back in with Andy Ruiz.’ He went straight back in with Andy Ruiz.
“There’s no doubt in AJ’s mind about who he’s fighting, and he will step back in the ring with Dubois at any moment, because he wants the gold, and we’ve probably only got another year left. Two fights, three fights max. So at this stage, it’s not like, ‘oh, how do we have a couple of easy fights to end a career?’ It’s like, excuse my French, I won’t say the word, but it’s like [s***] or bust.
“You know? It’s like, we’ve got nothing to preserve, we’ve got nothing to worry about, we’ve got nothing to hold on to. We’ve got nothing, other than the biggest draw in the division.”