Tyson Fury’s promotional status and the status of his proposed fight with Anthony Joshua is up in the air and the topic of plenty of discussion, but Fury himself says he’s got a clear promoter, and that it’s Turki Alalshikh.
“Turki (is) the promoter [sic] of the GK, till I retire,” Fury posted in his Instagram story.
Technically, Alalshikh does not have a promoter’s license and isn’t actually a promoter, at least on record for any event the money he controls has paid for, but neither is Al Haymon for any single
card that Premier Boxing Champions have run. We have all always known that Tom Brown is not running the show at PBC, and we know that events backed by Turki Alalshikh are under his control, no matter who is officially listed among the various and sundry promoters of record.
Fury has been linked with Zuffa Boxing after attending the UFC show at the White House on Sunday evening. Whether he’s ever officially part of Zuffa Boxing or not, it’s quite possible — seems likely, even — that Zuffa will be the promoters of record for Fury vs Joshua. White has said he will be the promoter for the fight. Frank Warren and Matchroom’s Eddie Hearn have disputed this, but everyone has basically fallen in line when Alalshikh is the one paying to make a fight happen, which is reasonable, because — well, he’s paying to make it happen. What he wants goes, in short.
Fury is just acknowledging who’s really calling the shots, aside from himself. It’s not Frank Warren, who has promoted him for years, and it’s not going to be Dana White, either.
It is perhaps worth noting that Fury saying something is in effect “until he retires” probably doesn’t mean as much as it seems on the surface, given the amount of times he has already retired. At 38 in August, he may have another two or three retirements left in him.
