Frank Warren has revealed that Anthony Joshua has turned down the opportunity to face WBC world heavyweight champion Tyson Fury in a fight which would have been held at Wembley Stadium.
Fury last week revealed that he sent a proposed contract to the former two-time unified world heavyweight champion for the month and venue in question above.
Warren spoke on Talksport, confirming that Joshua has refused to take the fight in favour of returning to the ring in August before facing Wilder in December following conversations between Eddie Hearn and George Warren.
“Last week, a written proposal was sent to Matchroom for AJ to fight Tyson in September.
“Eddie Hearn came back and spoke to my son George, who said it will take a couple of days to see where they are with it.
“Couple of days went by and George met yesterday with AJ’s management company.
“They confirmed that AJ is fighting in Dubai in December, that is his preferred route.
“There is a space open in August but they basically do not want to do the fight.
“That is what happened. When Tyson said there was a draft contract, what happened is we had prepared a draft contract the last time we had negotiations.
“So there was nothing really to be concerned about in terms of negotiations it was just if they wanted the fight or not.
“So the situation is, Tyson is desperate to make the fight happen, as he was against Usyk.
“But AJ has chosen not to take the fight and that is where we are at.”
The contest had been talked-up to take place in December of last year following Joshua’s rematch defeat to Oleksandr Usyk in Saudi Arabia last August. Fury had called out Joshua to challenge him despite his defeat to Usyk, and negotiations took place before collapsing over contractual issues.
Warren insisted that the only reason for that fight not happening last December was due to Joshua not having a trainer. Warren continues to add that he does not understand why Joshua can’t fight Fury in September and then proceed to fight in December against Wilder.
“The terms were agreed over a fight to take place but the only reason it didn’t take place is because Frank Smith of Matchroom that the fight would never have happened anyway because AJ wasn’t ready.
“And more importantly, he didn’t have a trainer. So that is where we are.
“I don’t know why AJ can’t fight in September and then go and fight Wilder in Dubai afterwards.
“If AJ gets beat by Wilder in December, I don’t think [the fight will happen] because he’d have got beaten by a person Fury has beaten three times.
“This is the time to make the fight, this is what we should all be focussing on.”
