By Charles Brun: Eddie Hearn says he will “likely” make an offer to 35-year-old journeyman Dillian Whyte to face Anthony Joshua in a rematch in a stadium fight on July 29th or August 6th in London, England.
Hearn says the rematch with Whyte (29-3, 19 KOs) makes the “most sense” for the former two-time heavyweight champion Joshua (25-3, 22 KOs) to get ready to fight in Saudi Arabia in December against Deontay Wilder or Tyson Fury.
It’s still not sure that Joshua will fight before his December clash, Hearn says. He will be meeting with the Saudi reps next week, and at that time, he’ll find out if it’s okay to let Joshua take a tune-up in July or August against Whyte.
Surprisingly, Hearn still believes British boxing fans are keen to see the Joshua vs. Whyte fight after all these years. If Hearn goes ahead with his wacky idea of placing Joshua-Whyte in a large stadium in London, it could be a ghost town, with a handful of diehard fans wanting to see this outdated fight for old time’s sake.
You can argue that this contest is past its sell-by date by at least three years, perhaps as many as five. Whyte is old, shot, and just godawful at this stage of his career. This fight is worse than the Amir Khan vs. Kell Brook clash, a match ten years past its sell-by date.
Whyte has been knocked out in two out of his last four fights, and he’s coming off a highly controversial 12-round majority decision win over Jermaine Franklin last November.
It’s reasonable to say that if that fight had been staged outside of the UK, Whyte would have lost, putting his record at 1-3 in his last 4 fights.
“It’s very likely that we’ll make Dillian an offer to fight AJ in July,” said Eddie Hearn to iFL TV about Anthony Joshua’s tune-up contest this summer to get him ready to fight Deontay Wilder or Tyson Fury in December in Saudi Arabia. “That’s the fight that would make sense [for Joshua].
“We would go in a stadium. You have the UFC that just pulled out of July 22nd. We go 29th, August 26th, or something like that. We may go the first week of August, but again, until we have these meetings next week, I just can’t give you the answers on that. I think we’re going to London,” said Hearn about where he would stage the Joshua vs. Whyte rematch.
