Oleksandr Usyk’s promoter, Alex Krassyuk, is doubtful that the Tyson Fury fight goes ahead after this weeks developments, but is willing to wait until the end of the week to attempt to make it work.
Following a positive close to last week with Usyk verbally accepting a 70/30 purse split in Fury’s favour, many fans thought they would be seeing an undisputed heavyweight champion crowned on April 29 at Wembley Stadium.
Fury then posted a video demanding there be no rematch clause, something that it’s understood was negotiated and agreed weeks ago. This prompted Usyk to claim the Brit was moving the goalposts at every opportunity and ‘ducking’ him.
Krassyuk told IFL TV that they expected the draft contract very soon if there’s any hope left for the original fight timeline.
“I would say it’s more probable not to happen, rather than to happen. This week is the deadline. [Tuesday] we would expect to get the draft agreement somehow.
So probably it would take some time then to review and to see what’s in. I don’t know. This week should definitely be the deadline for all of us.”
“But, the good thing is, both fighters claim that they want this fight. I know it 500% from Usyk’s side. This is the best thing he wants. He’s not looking for Tyson Fury. He’s looking for the WBC belt – the one which is pending in his collection.”
The promoter, though, doesn’t buy that Fury wants the fight.
“Our impression is that he doesn’t want to fight. He’s avoiding the fight. He was out of the training camp until yesterday and just five weeks left.
Though he claims it’s still enough for him, but how could a champion prepare for the undisputed heavyweight match just five weeks? Only because his bluff was called. It doesn’t sound realistic. He has no trainer, he has no sparring partners, he has infrastructure in the training camp, which is really complicated thing to execute.
That’s why for us it doesn’t look realistic at the moment.”
More developments are expected today in negotiations that are turning increasingly sour.