Hearn raises drug-testing discrepancy in Joshua-Fury contracts

Eddie Hearn says Anthony Joshua and Tyson Fury were given different contractual terms governing when drug testing should begin for their proposed heavyweight fight.

Joshua and Fury signed separate agreements with Turki Alalshikh, but differences over the venue, date and testing arrangements have held up an official announcement. Cardiff’s Principality Stadium is being considered for December 11 after Joshua’s side resisted proposals to stage the fight in the United States.

Hearn said Joshua’s agreement required both fighters to enter a testing programme immediately after the contracts were signed more than three months ago. He does not believe Fury’s contract contained the same obligation.

“The drug-testing protocol was the same as what had always been in there. It wasn’t adhered to in full,” Hearn told Boxing News after Matchroom’s Pat Brown-John Hedges event. “I don’t actually necessarily blame Tyson Fury for that, because I don’t think, as we found out on many occasions, what’s in AJ’s contract is not necessarily in Tyson Fury’s contract.”

Hearn made clear that he was not accusing Fury of refusing to enrol in testing or breaching the terms of his own agreement.

“Testing was supposed to start when the original contracts were signed, and it didn’t for them,” he said. “I don’t think he had in his contract that it had to start then. So this is not me saying he didn’t enroll. I don’t think he was obligated to enroll. But in our contract, he was obligated to enroll.”

A source close to the negotiations told BoxingScene that Fury will “start drug testing” once the fight is formally announced. Fighters would not ordinarily begin a testing programme tailored to a particular bout before the event has been confirmed, leaving Hearn’s complaint centred on the way the two contracts were drawn up rather than any claim that Fury avoided or failed a test.

Cardiff under consideration

The venue has been the main point of contention. Joshua’s contract required the contest to take place in Britain, according to Hearn, while Fury’s contained no equivalent provision amid discussions about taking the fight to the US. The dates listed in the separate agreements were also not aligned.

Hearn said Joshua’s team had allowed a number of smaller contractual issues to pass because it did not want to jeopardise a fight that has been discussed for years. The location, however, was not negotiable.

“These are small things, there’s been many issues along the way with the contract that we’ve let slip and ride because we want to stay in the fight, and we want to make sure the fight happens,” he said. “So the ones that we weren’t willing to let slip and ride, obviously 90 per cent of that was the location. TKO involvement was a little bit of that as well, but mainly it was the location.”

Hearn said Matchroom encountered similar inconsistencies while representing Conor Benn for his two fights with Chris Eubank Jnr in 2025. He cited conflicting terms covering dressing rooms, ring walks, hydration limits and fines as examples of provisions being agreed differently with the two camps.

“People are so desperate to get deals done, rather than actually getting them done properly, they just say yes,” Hearn said. “But what happens is, down the line, it ends up kicking you in the nuts.”

Previous testing cases

Fury has faced anti-doping proceedings during his career. UK Anti-Doping charged him over elevated levels of nandrolone metabolites in a sample collected in February 2015, although he denied knowingly taking a prohibited substance.

The case was settled in December 2017 with a two-year ban backdated to December 2015. The outcome did not affect Fury’s November 2015 victory over Wladimir Klitschko, and UKAD recorded that subsequent samples produced no adverse analytical findings.

An allegation that Fury refused to provide a sample in September 2016 was withdrawn as part of the settlement. He also twice tested positive that month for a cocaine metabolite in VADA samples, findings related to recreational drug use rather than a performance-enhancing substance.

Before his first fight with Deontay Wilder in 2018, Fury had also not initially enrolled in the WBC’s VADA-administered Clean Boxing Program despite being ranked by the sanctioning body. He later completed the process and the fight went ahead. No positive tests for performance-enhancing drugs have been publicly reported during his subsequent run of major heavyweight fights.

Joshua, meanwhile, has had several fights affected by adverse findings involving opponents. After his December 2016 win over Eric Molina, the American tested positive for dexamethasone and was later handed a two-year UKAD ban.

Jarrell Miller was then removed from Joshua’s planned US debut in 2019 after returning adverse findings for GW1516, EPO and human growth hormone.

Joshua encountered another two cases around the same fight in 2023. Dillian Whyte was withdrawn from their scheduled rematch following an adverse VADA finding, which a later investigation attributed to a contaminated supplement. His replacement, Robert Helenius, was knocked out by Joshua but later received a two-year UKAD ban after a pre-fight sample tested positive for clomifene.

For now, the testing issue appears to be another example of Joshua and Fury having signed agreements containing different obligations, rather than a dispute over whether Fury is willing to be tested.

The fight still cannot be formally announced until the remaining terms, including the date and venue, are settled. A source close to the negotiations told BoxingScene that Fury will enter drug testing once that announcement is made.