Eddie Hearn, promoter for British heavyweight champion Fabio Wardley, is frustrated with the recent drama for a mandatory fight with Olympic bronze medal winner Frazer Clarke.
The British Boxing Board of Control ordered Wardley to make a mandatory defense against Clarke.
On Wednesday, the purse bids were scheduled to take place – but they were canceled at the last minute after Clarke’s promoter, Boxxer, removed him from the purse bid.
Boxxer CEO Ben Shalom claims to have offered Wardley a career-high purse to face Clarke on Sky Sports. But Wardley took to social media to deny Shalom’s take – and says the money presented was less than he made for his last fight.
Hearn believed the Wardley vs. Clarke showdown was going to take place. Now, he needs to find a new date for Wardley to stay busy.
“The biggest shambles I’ve ever seen. It’s frustrating when you get a fighter who starts to become a bit of a star and then the politics of boxing and fights that are ordered and mandatory defenses get in the way of our plans,” Hearn told IFL TV.
“People start messing around, they don’t know what they’re doing and it derails momentum. I’m not bothered about the fact that Frazer Clarke’s pulled out… I’m just worried about Fabio Wardley, because we could have just locked in a date and now we’re left with no fight and we’ll have to lock in a date for July.
“It’s just a shambles and I feel for Frazer Clarke because he looks like a complete idiot and Frazer Clarke’s credibility quite frankly is on the floor and I feel like he’s been hung out to dry. I know Frazer and he wants to fight, he’s a fighter and he’s a very good fighter. That fight was a great fight, it was a pick ’em fight, but now he has to go and fight Harry Armstrong at York Hall on June 10 and he’s just going to get ridiculed and I don’t understand the process. I’m told Frazer is devastated and he was in tears in the office being told that he couldn’t take the fight.”
Hearn believes Shalom was too worried about losing the purse bid.
If Hearn would have been successful at the purse bid, the contest would have been staged on DAZN. Shalom was trying to do whatever possible to have the fight take place on Sky Sports.
“You’re too scared to lose a purse bid to Matchroom and DAZN, that’s the reality,” Hearn said.
“You’ve got a chance for a tremendous fight and if you believe your guy can win, that fight had so much press, so much rivalry, it’s the classic all-British heavyweight title fight and you robbed the fans and the fighters of it.”