Tyson Fury vs Anthony Joshua talks were ‘propaganda’, says Deontay Wilder

‘As long as I knew I had that contract and we were going to activate it, there weren’t no concerns’

Deontay Wilder dismissed negotiations for a fight between Tyson Fury and Anthony Joshua earlier this year as “propaganda” and insisted he was never concerned about losing the chance to regain his WBC heavyweight belt.

Fury’s team had claimed a contractual clause for a third fight between the pair had expired at the start of this year, however, an arbitration hearing eventually ruled that the Briton must honour the original contract.

Eddie Hearn had been negotiating to take the all-British undisputed title fight to Saudi Arabia but was forced to pause those plans following the ruling before Joshua’s defeat by Oleksandr Usyk left those hopes in tatters.

Asked if he was ever worried about missing the opportunity to avenge the sole defeat of his professional career, Wilder said: “The Fury-AJ talk, it was never going to happen. They never had a contract to begin with.

“You know it was all propaganda and it was nothing I was concerned about because I knew the truth. Certain fans and people just take the first thing they hear without doing research and they just go away with it.

“People want to be first nowadays instead of being correct. That was the situation and one thing for sure, when you put black ink to white paper it’s sealed you know, it’s called a contract.

“As long as I knew I had that contract and we were going to activate it, there weren’t no concerns or worries about the talks. They just hyped people up for nothing.”

Joshua has previously predicted that Wilder would win the trilogy fight leading Fury to brand his fellow Briton an “idiot” this week.

“These are rivals of mine and if they want me to lose I would be the same as them, a beaten fighter,” Fury told Behind The Gloves. “But there is a difference. I am not a beaten fighter, they can all gang up on me it makes no difference. You know, maybe they wish that would happen, but I don’t think they do.

“This is coming from a guy who now has no belts, before it was ‘I don’t care who the fighter is it is all about the belts’ but now he needs to wins the belts back doesn’t he? But I am not here to slate anyone and I am fully focused on Deontay Wilder right now.”