?I can confirm that me and Deontay Wilder are in negotiations,? said Fury via the Manchester Evening News, ?and it?s very close to being done??
The possibility of WBC heavyweight champion Deontay Wilder defending his title against former unified heavyweight champion Tyson Fury just took a giant leap forward.
According to Fury, he and Wilder are in ?deep? discussions and are ?very close? to reaching an agreement.
?I can confirm that me and Deontay Wilder are in negotiations,? said Fury via the Manchester Evening News, ?and it?s very close to being done.
?It?s out there now and I can reveal that negotiations are very strong for December and we?re almost done with this deal. I won?t be overlooking Francesco Pianeta. He?s going to give me the right fight and the right work to prepare me for Wilder.?
Fury, who is still formally on the comeback trail after his two and half year hiatus, must first get by Francesco Pianeta, the 6-foot-5-inch southpaw from Calabria, Italy, when the two men meet at Windsor Park in Belfast on August 18.
Pianeta has lost two of his last three fights and will help Fury work up a sweat, and while he?ll present more of a challenge than compliant Sefer Seferi, Fury?s last opponent, defeating the ?Gypsy King? seems highly unlikely.
?I?ve got to flatten him first then Wilder let?s dance.?
Fury?s promoter, Frank Warren, is all-in concerning a bout with Wilder, even though Fury will be the underdog.
?First of all, we want to see what he looks like on the August 18,? Warren told talkSPORT this morning. ?Hopefully he will come through it well but reports from the gym are that he?s looking well.
?Tyson, as he?s said himself, has been talking about Wilder in the last few weeks and it?s a fight I think the British fans would like to see.
?It wouldn?t happen in the autumn, if it happens it will be sometime in November or December.
?I?m pretty confident we can make it happen. It takes two to make a deal and if you really want to make a deal you will make it happen.?
Wilder?s team, like Fury?s, is hedging their bets, but opportunity is knocking and they like what they hear.
?Both teams want the biggest fight possible,? Wilder?s trainer/manager, Jay Deas, told the Tuscaloosa News. ?This would be an enormous fight, just enormous.
?One thing I can say for certain: If this can be worked out, Deontay Wilder would have been involved in the two biggest fights of 2018, Wilder-Ortiz and Wilder-Fury. And if he were to win against Fury, as we fully expect, then Deontay would be an international superstar in control of the boxing world.?
I?m not sure Wilder being in control of the boxing world is precisely what the boxing world needs, but if he and Fury meet and the fight isn?t a stinker, I?ll abridge those remarks accordingly.
?This would be fight of the year,? added Deas optimistically. ?We?d have 13-feet, 4 inches and 500 pounds of hard-punching, trash-talking, knockout heavyweights.?
Put that way, it?s hard to disagree. But bigger isn?t always better ? just most of the time.
