Unbeaten heavyweight and Tokyo Olympian Frazer Clarke (6-0, 5KOs) has been withdrawn from the scheduled purse bid for the British heavyweight championship against current holder Fabio Wardley (16-0, 15KOs).
Eddie Hearn, who promotes Wardley, revealed via social media that he was informed by the British Boxing Board of Control that Ben Shalom and his promotional entity BOXXER had withdrawn Clarke from the bidding procedure, which was scheduled to start at noon BST.
Hearn did not hide his frustration and stated that the situation with the pull-out by Clarke & BOXXER was a “complete joke and a waste of our time”.
Heard from the BBBofC that Boxxer has pulled @BigFrazeBoxer out of the @Fabio_Wardley purse bid today. What a complete joke and a waste of our time. Robbing the fighters of opportunity and the fans of a brilliant fight. Shambles.
— Eddie Hearn (@EddieHearn) May 10, 2023
It was announced yesterday by BOXXER that Clarke would return to action on June 10th at York Hall, London, against Henry Armstrong. Clarke took to Twitter on reports that he would be facing such an opponent and called it deflating.
Last month Clarke and Hearn met in Cardiff as Joe Cordina successfully attempted to regain his IBF world super-featherweight title. The pair discussed how to proceed in making the ordered title fight with Wardley. Speaking to ProBox TV at the event, Hearn was reassured by Clarke that he would not be fighting on June 10th despite his doubts regarding BOXXER’s intentions.
“We had a chat and he guarantees me that he is not fighting on June 10th.” Hearn said in an exclusive interview for ProBox TV News.
If successful with the purse bid, Hearn sought and explored opportunities to take the Wardley and Clarke contest to Portman Road stadium in Ipswich, just a shade under 30,000 in seated capacity.
