Frank Warren, co-promoter for WBC heavyweight champion Tyson Fury, says the negotiations for a fight with Anthony Joshua have been put on hold ‘out of respect’ for the recent passing of Queen Elizabeth II.
This past Thursday, Queen Elizabeth II passed away. That afternoon, the UK began an official period of mourning. Most sporting events were postponed – including the O2 Arena card that featured Claressa Shields vs. Savannah Marshall – which was scheduled to take place this past Saturday.
Fury recently approached Joshua with an offer of a 60-40 monetary split for a year-end showdown in the UK.
Joshua accepted the terms but there are still plenty of details to work out.
Their discussions will resume once the period of mourning is over.
“We’ve put it all on hold at the moment. It wasn’t appropriate obviously. That’s how we feel,” Warren said to Talk Sport.
“We’ve put it on hold and will pick up on it in the next week or so. From our perspective, we don’t feel it is appropriate out of respect for what has happened.”
Joshua is looking to revamp his career after suffering back to back twelve round decision losses at the hands of Oleksandr Usyk, who holds the IBF, IBO, WBA, WBO heavyweight titles. The second of those two fights played out last month in Saudi Arabia.
Fury saw action back in April, when he fulfilled a mandatory obligation by knocking out challenger Dillian Whyte before a crowd of 94,000 at Wembley Stadium.
