AJ plan to fight Fury or Wilder in April

ANTHONY JOSHUA wants to fight Tyson Fury to silence talk of him “borrowing” his rival’s belts.

The WBA, IBF and WBO champion’s main priority remains a clash with WBC title-holder Deontay Wilder to become undisputed heavyweight king.

But promoter Eddie Hearn says Fury’s claims that Joshua has borrowed his belts has left the current champion frustrated.

Fury was stripped of the IBF title soon after beating Wladimir Klitschko in 2015 before he relinquished the WBO and WBA belts a year later.

Joshua has since collected all three titles and gone on to become one of the biggest names in the sport.

Prefer

Hearn said: “I think if it was man on man and there were no belts, nothing, I think Joshua would probably prefer Fury because there’s always been the ‘Oh he was the champ, you won his belts’ and stuff like that.

“So maybe that’s in his head a little bit, but he wants to be undisputed.

“Fury beat Klitschko but this lineal thing is quite ridiculous.

“The lineal championship doesn’t actually exist. It’s a mythical title that people want to use when they don’t have any belts.

“So he’s the man who beat the man, something like that, who failed a drugs test, took two years out and basically refused to train or get in the ring.

“So it’s not Joshua’s fault – they were available and he won them but I think in the back of his mind he wants to do a job on Fury as well. He wants to do a job on both of them and he’s going to violently do that.”

Hearn insists he has held talks with Wilder’s team in the last week about the American facing Joshua at Wembley on April 13, adding: “Wilder may choose to rematch Fury, it’s a big fight.

“It just all depends how much Wilder wants to be undisputed champion.

“If Joshua fights Wilder it’s going to be X-rated because someone’s head is getting taken off. So it’s very different styles of fights.

“Fury’s stock has gone up.

So we’d fight either on

April 13.”

The Matchroom chief has revealed their offer to

Wilder will be a two-fight deal with the second clash in the US.

He said:

“The first

Wilder fight would be here and we’d agree to a second

Wilder fight in America.

“That’s the difference this time, we’re saying,

‘We’ll give you two’.

“Last time they accepted one fight with a rematch clause for

Joshua.”