Dana White has addressed the rumours that he was attempting to prise Anthony Joshua away from Eddie Hearn.
White is currently looking to add boxing promotion to his already hectic workload and he’s been linked with approaches for the likes of Joshua and WBC lightweight champion Mikey Garcia.
In March, reports began circulating that White was preparing a multi-fight deal for ‘AJ’ to make him the face of Zuffa Boxing and the UFC president addressed those rumours at UFC Liverpool’s post-fight press conference on Sunday night.
“I never made him an offer, ever,” White categorically stated.
“[That came out of] thin air. I never made him an offer. We were supposed to meet. But we never met, we never talked money and we never did anything.”
White was supposed to be in Cardiff in March for Joshua’s unification victory over Joseph Parker but a flare-up of his long-standing ear issues meant that he was unable to fly.
It had been suggested that White was looking to offer ‘AJ’ a $500 million (£353 million) contract which would see him fight several times under the Zuffa banner but that’s a claim that has been totally rubbished by the UFC president.
“That isn’t even, really, the kind of deal I was looking to structure,” White said.
“Because when we talked, he had told me he was going to stay with Eddie Hearn. He told me he was going to stay with Eddie. He was never going to get rid of Eddie Hearn and that was never the plan. It was never like I was trying to move in and steal him from Hearn.
“The deal was that I felt we could a lot of value to them in the United States. So we could have cut some kind of a deal for the US. He’s big in England, everybody knows who he is in England. And I have the machine to make him big in the United States. That was the plan.”
