Eddie Hearn isn’t budging when it comes to bringing Tyson Fury vs. Anthony Joshua home, no matter what Dana White has to say about it.
White has accused Hearn of preventing the highly anticipated heavyweight boxing match from coming to fruition, recently calling it “the weirdest thing ever” that Hearn and his team have allegedly halted negotiations. One major sticking point appears to be whether the fight will take place in Fury and Joshua’s native U.K. or if it could be brought to a major venue in the U.S.
According to Hearn, there are no more negotiations to be done, and all he and Joshua want is for the original bout agreement to be honored.
“Dana White says we are the only one upsetting this fight,” Hearn told iFL TV. “Dana White has tried to get involved in a fight that he has nothing to do with and to get Sela to break their contract, scrap a British fight, and bring it to America. He thinks that he’s not causing a problem in this fight? All we have ever done is said, ‘We’ve signed our contract. Just honor the contract that we’ve signed.’
“We’ve never done anything else and what he can’t get his head around is that Anthony Joshua won’t take a little bit more money to do the fight in America, because he cares. He cares where the fight is. He cares about British boxing, and he cares about the contract that he signed. And Dana White thinks you can throw a little bit of money at someone and they’ll dance to your f*cking tune. Well, guess what? Not on A.J.’s watch. That is why, unfortunately for these people, the fight will not be taking place in America, because Anthony Joshua is not a sellout.”
Fury and Joshua both recently scored wins over Mariusz Wach and Kristian Prenga, respectively, to keep their matchup on track after Ring Magazine previously announced the British boxing stars would fight sometime near the end of 2026. As of now, there is no confirmed date nor location for the bout.
Hearn puts the delay of an official announcement squarely on White’s side, claiming they have offered more money to Joshua to fight Fury in the U.S., but Joshua isn’t budging.
“Anthony Joshua could have taken many millions more to do the fight in America and it was totally on him,” Hearn said. “‘Forget Eddie Hearn. What do I want? I want this fight in Britain.’ Now, do I want A.J. to make more money? By the way, for anyone that’s got a brain, when A.J. makes a load more money, guess who else makes a load more money? Me. You call me, you say I’m mad about money, you’re saying it’s the only thing I care about, yet when I want to do the fight in Britain, it’s ‘fake patriotism.’ I thought I was crazy about money. What is it?
“We want the fight in Britain. The support that we’ve had on social media, my social media, A.J.’s social media, has made us double down our principles on this. We’re not trying to hurt the fight. We signed a contract. The whole thing’s crazy. What they’re now doing is they’re sulking because they can’t be involved, and because Dana White went out and told everybody, ‘I know where the fight is. You’ll see, you’ll see, you’ll see.’ I’m not even going to rub their nose in it, because I don’t need to. It’s done. But ultimately, the one thing he said previously and you know what, it just comes back and it resonates with me more and more and more. We are not the same. And I promise you one thing, we are not the same.”
As the wait for the dream fight drags on, Hearn is convinced public sentiment is turning in favor of Fury and Joshua meeting in the U.K.
“We got to a situation, we set out some terms where it might be able to agree,” Hearn said. “The money that we discussed, ultimately, probably was deliverable, was agreed. And Anthony turned around and I think he never even wanted to send a new addendum, honestly, but we were put under that much pressure where it was like, ‘Look, if you really want to go to America, blah blah blah blah blah.’ And all these people were coming back on certain things and in the meantime he’d also seen the response of the British public, and by the way, so had I. I’ve got to be honest with you, it makes you fight that little bit harder. He turned around to me with the two offers on the table and said, ‘No, I just want to stick to the original contract. I want to do this fight in the U.K.’
“So from there we put these guys in a position where it was like, ‘You can’t do it.’ Obviously, everyone went crazy, they threw their toys out the pram, certain people. They couldn’t believe that A.J. was standing firm on the U.K. ‘Oh, this is just Eddie Hearn doing it because he wants to make sure that Dana White doesn’t win or is not involved.’ I don’t give a f*ck. A.J. makes the decisions. And people say, ‘A.J. turned down more money to do it in the U.S. because he wanted to do it in the U.K.’ Yes. I’m not going to lie to you, that’s exactly what happened. So, right now, over the last week, we have been in constant communication and—I can’t say negotiation because the contract’s already signed—but discussions with Netflix and with Sela, and we believe we’re in a great position to move forward. I can’t tell you dates and venues or what’s going to happen because an official announcement will come from Turki Alalshikh, but I’m hopeful that over the next week we could be in a position to get that announcement for a U.K. fight, and if we do, there will be unbelievable celebrations from the British public. I think A.J. should be knighted in the process, to be honest with you.”
Hearn was asked if there was any truth to the rumor that Principality Stadium in Cardiff, Wales, had become a front-runner to host Fury vs. Joshua and while he said that is his preference, he understands that booking Wembley Stadium in London is more appealing on a global level.
At the end of the day, Hearn wants it to be clear that it’s Joshua who will make the final call.
“The reason that I’m doing this is because I want the fight in the U.K., but my instructions from Anthony Joshua are make sure this fight is in the U.K.,” Hearn said. “You cannot underestimate the noise and the patriotism and the support of people online. And Turki sees that. I think Turki’s now probably excited by the reaction from the British fans to bring this fight to the U.K.
“Again, not going to start falling out with people, Dana White is the guy, Nick Khan is the guy that have tried desperately to bring this fight to the U.S. and not to stage this fight in the U.K. You’ve seen his comments, Dana White does not want this fight in the U.K., so that’s been the big problem, but I think finally now people are starting to see—because they’ve had no choice, because we’ve stayed firm against everybody—this is massive in the U.K. and it will be. We get this fight over the line for the U.K., wait until you see the reaction. It could be the biggest sporting event ever in the U.K. We know it’s the biggest fight ever.”
