📸 Amanda Westcott / Mark Robinson

World Boxing Council heavyweight champion Deontay Wilder has opened up exclusively to WBN on a potential fight with Dillian Whyte.

Wilder has lined up his next two fights, despite Whyte and his promoter Eddie Hearn bemoaning the fact the Briton has been mandatory with the WBC for over 600 days.

Recently completing a WBC stipulation against Dominic Breazeale in devastating fashion, Wilder has a voluntary period. The American is using that time to take on former opponent Luis Ortiz this fall.

Following the Ortiz rematch, Wilder has then set up a second outing with Tyson Fury. A fight the WBC has given its blessing so since the initial battle in December.

This means Whyte will be forced to wait until the summer of 2020, at least, for a crack at the green and gold belt.

Wilder believes the long delay is firmly the Silver title holder’s fault. Whyte has been offered numerous chances by Wilder and his team since becoming number one, as the ‘Bronze Bomber’ has moved to explain in explicit detail.

“At the end of the day, Dillian Whyte could’ve been given that opportunity,” Wilder exclusively told World Boxing News.

“I told Dillian Whyte, I gave him two options. I told him to sign with the PBC (Al Haymon’s Premier Boxing Champions) when he came from over here network shopping or whatever he was over here doing. So I told him, ‘yeah just sign with us, a one-fight deal. Then no problem we’ll get that fight on.

“We can get it on, I’ll give you that shot’. But that was one time – STRIKE.

“Then I told him to fight Luis Ortiz. ‘You fight him and you got my word, you got me’ – I said. And everybody knows when I speak, that’s my word, that’s my bond and I don’t go back on it.

“That’s why when I say things, I own up to all responsibility because I mean what I say. I mean it and I told you, ‘you got it if you beat Ortiz’.

“What did he do? He didn’t want to fight him – STRIKE TWO.”

“Then the WBC came and ordered him to fight Ortiz, they ORDERED him to, and he didn’t want the fight – that’s STRIKE THREE.”

Gaining considerable support for his cause in the UK, Whyte and Hearn have been applying pressure to WBC President Mauricio Sulaiman.

A scheduled clash with Oscar Rivas is approaching on July 20, something Hearn wants the WBC to make an official final eliminator.

Even if that’s ratified, the WBC would almost certainly sanction the Fury rematch due to their policy of making the best fights for the fans.







STRIKE FOUR

Adding a further swing and miss to his discussion on Whyte, Wilder is adamant the ‘Bodysnatcher’ has nobody else to blame but himself.

“I don’t want people to feel sorry for him I really don’t. I know I came out and said it’s a shame with what’s going on. But it’s a shame what’s been going on because of his own actions,” pointed out the undefeated puncher.

“I want to clear that up. It’s because of his own actions. He allowed himself not have this opportunity because he had the chance three times, really four.

“But I’m not going to bring up the situation of when I was going back to the Joshua because that’s where I told Hearn to put him on before that fight.

“I said, ‘If you give me Dillian then put Joshua on (straight after in the next fight). So that’s a solid STRIKE FOUR there,” he concluded.

Phil Jay is Editor of World Boxing News. Follow on Twitter @PhilDJay (article transcribed by Assistant Editor).