DEONTAY WILDER has until the end of the week to accept a fight with Anthony Joshua.
That’s according to promoter Eddie Hearn, who claims AJ is fed up with waiting for the American and is willing to arrange a bout with mandatory WBA challenged Alexander Povetkin instead.
Boxing fans are desperate to see Joshua unify the hotly-contested heavyweight division, but the Brit needs to defeat Wilder if he wants to get his hands on the WBA belt.
Talks have been going back and forth between the two parties for weeks, with Wilder keen on fighting in the US despite AJ’s insistence on a British battle.
And Hearn has warned Wilder he is now running out of time to accept Joshua’s latest terms, opening the door for a Wembley clash with Povetkin instead.
Hearn told Boxing Scene: “We all decided as a team that the first fight should be in the UK. It’s not a care of being arrogant but at the moment there’s a very clear A-side in the fight, and the fight should take place where that A-side wants that fight to take place.
“If Wilder wins he becomes the A-side, they [Wilder’s team] made a very strong offer, there’s no denying that, but it’s not an amount of money that’s going to change Anthony’s life.
“Joshua said: ‘Why aren’t we doing this fight at Wembley in front of 90,000?’ He’s asked me a lot of questions, particularly about how many Brits could we get into the arena in Vegas.
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“I said: ‘After casino guests and Americans? I dunno, six, seven, eight, nine thousand?’
“And he was a bit flat with it all, and he sort of felt after everything we’ve done – they’ve [the fans] supported him against (Wladimir) Klitschko of course, but also against (Carlos) Takam and (Joseph) Parker that we then just toodle of and say: ‘See you in Vegas’.
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“We’ve got a situation with Povetkin where probably next week they’ll (WBA) call for purse bids then it takes another two weeks for that. I think realistically two weeks is the absolute deadline.
“We’re speaking very frequently and to be fair to Deontay he understands. It’s not like he’s moaning about it. He always felt he’d have to come to the UK and like I said they made a strong offer.
“Some of the points in that offer weren’t acceptable, some were. We could have talked about them but it was just a decision from the team that the first one should be in the UK.
“We want to go in September and that’s either going to be, at this stage, Wilder or Povetkin, both tough fights. By the end of the week I want to be in a position to know if Wilder wants the fight.”
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