Anthony Joshua has taken to social media to fire back at claims that he is close to accepting a £15m step aside deal.
Speculation that AJ could forego his rematch with Oleksandr Usyk to enable a fight for the undisputed status has intensified over the past seven days.
There has been suggestion that there are big players in Saudi Arabia who are willing to stump up the cash in order to make this happen.
A flurry of news reports suggested that Joshua was close to penning a £15m deal to step aside from the Usyk rematch and allow the Ukrainian to fight Fury.
However, there doesn’t appear to have been much truth to those claims, with Joshua taking to social media to reveal that it’s the first he’s heard of it.
Anthony Joshua fires back at reports that he is “close to accepting” a £15million step-aside deal to enable Tyson Fury vs Oleksandr Usyk…
[🎥 @AnthonyJoshua] pic.twitter.com/46nmJ1ddfQ
— Michael Benson (@MichaelBensonn) January 24, 2022
MORE: Tyson Fury vs Oleksandr Usyk could be announced as soon as NEXT WEEK
As difficult as it will be to reject a figure like £15m, especially when Joshua doesn’t actually need to do anything, his supporters will be hoping that he doesn’t entertain the idea.
Joshua is already at risk of losing his footing at the summit of the heavyweight division. This would be yet another setback for him – a potentially fatal one for his career.
