Joshua versus Wilder bout may happen late this year, says Hearn

Eddie Hearn believes Anthony Joshua versus Deontay Wilder could happen towards the end of 2019, but insists there’s still a long way to go with regards to potential negotiations, reports metro.co.uk.

Joshua and Wilder have failed with their attempts to make an undisputed heavyweight mega-fight for all four world title belts over recent months.

Despite reported attempts from both fighters to make the fight, they have both opted to take on alternative opponents in the coming months.

Joshua travels to New York to fight Brooklyn boxer Jarrell Miller on June 1, while Wilder is set to take on his WBC mandatory contender Dominic Breazeale.

“November is the ideal date to make that fight [Joshua vs Wilder],’ Hearn told Boxing Social. ‘He [Wilder] was talking about he wants 50/50 – you know what, let the guys get on with their fights.

“Let him fight Breazeale, I hope he wins that fight. Let AJ try deal with Baby Miller at MSG and then we’ll try and make the fight. November, December is the date of that fight.

“Usyk is the mandatory for the WBO so he’ll be called as well. The undisputed fight would take priority of that and the winner would fight Usyk.”

However, Hearn did later admit that he doesn’t believe Wilder warrants the money he’s asking for.

“He doesn’t deserve 50/50,” Hearn told iFL TV. ‘It’s up to AJ, because he may never get the fight.

“It doesn’t sound to me like a guy who really wants to fight. Maybe he’s saying that because he knows he won’t get it.”

Hearn admits Joshua is facing a ‘logjam’ of mandatories and may need to vacate a belt before he ever gets the much-anticipated unification fight against Wilder.

‘‘We don’t want to vacate one of the titles because we want the undisputed fight,’’ Hearn told iFL TV in an exhaustive interview.

“I mean, don’t get me wrong, if a title was vacated, we’d still fight Wilder – but it wouldn’t be the undisputed fight. That’s the golden chalice. So that’s why we want it to happen in November, December.”

Asked what mandatories Joshua is facing, Hearn continued: ‘WBO with [Oleksandr] Usyk, IBF with [Kubrat] Pulev is after the WBO mandatory [so next year], and then there would be a WBA mandatory, which is not set yet.

“So he [Joshua] is going to have a logjam of mandatories. So after Miller, he’s either going to fight Wilder

“If he fights the undisputed fight then he’s got to fight Usyk after. Then he’s got to fight Pulev as another mandatory after that. And then he’s got to fight the WBA one.

“So that’s when you get into the realms of, are we vacating a belt here? [Wladimir] Klitschko never vacated a belt, but he got criticised because of the mandatories that were put in front of him – was it Tony Thompson he fought twice?”