Account
Tyson Fury vs. Dillian Whyte Fight Date Targeted; Frank Warren Wins Rights with $41M
January 28, 2022
A WBC heavyweight title fight between Tyson Fury and Dillian Whyte is officially set after promoter Frank Warren's Queensberry Promotions won the rights to the fight via bid.
According to ESPN's Mike Coppinger, Warren's winning bid was $41.025 million. The only other bid came from Eddie Hearn's Matchroom Boxing at $32,222,222.
While not yet official, plans are in place for the bout to occur on April 23 in the United Kingdom, per Coppinger. It will reportedly be an ESPN pay-per-view in the United States and a BT Sport pay-per-view in the UK.
Per Coppinger, there had been negotiations leading up to the finalization of Fury vs. Whyte in an effort to get Fury out of the contest and Anthony Joshua out of his fight with Oleksandr Usyk.
That would have allowed Fury and Usyk to fight for the undisputed heavyweight title in Saudi Arabia in June, but talks broke down.
Instead, Fury will face his English countryman in what will be the first major world heavyweight title bout of Whyte's career.
The 33-year-old Whyte is 28-2 in his career with 19 wins by way of knockout. Most recently, he beat Alexander Povetkin for the interim WBC heavyweight title in March 2021, avenging a loss to Povetkin in August 2020.
Fury, 33, remains undefeated in his career with a nearly flawless record of 31-0-1.
Each of Fury's past two fights came against American Deontay Wilder. After fighting Wilder to a draw in 2018, Fury beat him by seventh-round technical knockout in February 2020 and by 11th-round knockout in October 2021.
By beating Wilder in the 2020 bout, Fury won the vacant WBC and The Ring heavyweight titles.
If Fury vs. White occurs in the United Kingdom as planned, it will be Fury's first fight in the UK since August 2018 when he beat Italy's Francesco Pianeta in Northern Ireland.
While White is on tap first for Fury, a victory over White could set the stage for him to have a unification bout against the winner of the upcoming rematch between Usyk and Joshua.