Eddie Hearn has confirmed that Dillian Whyte is set to receive a contract to fight Anthony Joshua.
The promoter had previously stated that an offer had been made to Whyte to fight ‘AJ’ in August. However, Whyte recently dismissed suggestions he had priced himself out of the fight: "We've had one three-line email about the fight, no conversations at all,” he told Talksport. We've been trying to contact Eddie Hearn for one month, multiple phone calls and emails, they've just gone missing.”
Hearn is eager to name Joshua’s next opponent, with just under seven weeks to go until Joshua’s proposed fight date, ahead of his plans to face Deontay Wilder in December. Seeking to clarify the situation, the Matchroom boss insisted that the fight with Whyte remains a possibility but negotiations need to be concluded quickly.
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“We made an offer to Dillian Whyte four or five weeks ago and they came back and the exact wording was ‘absolutely not, this is unacceptably low’ and basically nowhere near a number that they’d accept,” Hearn told Boxing Social.
“I funnelled that back to AJ and the team and we said, ‘okay, we’ll move onto another opponent’. That was it. Now they come out today out of the blue and say ‘we accept that offer’, right when we’re about to announce or are in final negotiations with another opponent.
“We went straight back to Dillian and said ‘can you confirm that you accept that offer’ and they said ‘yes, we do’ and I said ‘fantastic’, so we’re getting them a contract. They’ll have a contract today, we need to move at pace but if they’re serious that fight can 100 per cent happen.”
Joshua had been linked with facing undefeated heavyweight - and former sparring partner - Agit Kabayel but Whyte would be another familiar opponent for ‘AJ’, having faced each other in 2015. Hearn is hoping for no complications as he looks to reach an agreement for the rematch.
“This contract is not going to be difficult. It’s a set purse, there’s no travel or extreme media obligations, Hearn continued, “he’s going to have to attend the press conference and get whatever tickets he wants and things like that, but it’s pretty simple.
“We don’t want to come back with a million things on the contract. We do have to move at pace because it’s seven weeks on Saturday, but I’d love that fight to happen and hopefully they’re real.”
