The negotiations for an Anthony Joshua-Dillian Whyte rematch have hit another snag as the potential date draws ever closer.
A second fight between the pair following their 2015 battle that saw Joshua emerge victorious via KO looked all but dead last week when promoter Eddie Hearn said Whyte wasn’t accepting the terms.
This led the Brixton fighter to state publicly that he would take what was on offer to get the fight made, claiming Hearn and team had been evasive when he responded in private about the August 12 bout.
Hearn then confirmed to Boxing Social that he sent a contract for Whyte to sign. That was received on Saturday, and Whyte has now told TalkSPORT that it’s with his lawyers. Things aren’t as simple as he expected, though.
“Well we had a contract, the contract’s with my lawyer and my lawyers have gone back to him. But there’s a lot of things that have been said publicly that are not happening when we’re negotiating.
“It’s like this, he said, ‘We’re gonna send a simple contract,’ and then they sent a very complicated contract with a lot of hoops and a lot of hooks to hook me in.”
Specifically, Whyte takes issue with a rematch clause on Joshua’s side that would prevent him from moving on should he win.
“I just want a simple contract, simple fight, winner moves on and has a big fight in Saudi Arabia. This fight for me is about the opportunity, it’s not about the money, that’s why I’m taking the fight for the money they’ve offered me.
“But now they’re trying to put a rematch clause in there that ties me up for a year and messes everything up, I’m not interested in that.”
“They want the ability to change the date and the venue. I’m like, ‘No, let’s just have the fight on August 12 and that’s it.'”
“It is about the opportunity, but with the rematch involved – if I beat him then I don’t get an opportunity, I’ve got to wait and fight Joshua again. Obviously the big carrot and the big prize is to fight Deontay Wilder in December in Saudi Arabia. I would love to fight Joshua, beat him, then go on and fight Wilder and beat him.”
Whyte also disregarded any claims that there were two other opponents waiting to sign should he decide not to, believing that he’s the only option on the table to give Joshua ‘a proper fight.’
It’s clear Whyte wants to swoop in and take the opportunity to fight Deontay Wilder at the end of the year, something that Joshua’s team have been working on for months now.
Could the rematch clause put an end to the fight? News on that is expected imminently.