Anthony Joshua’s win over Kubrat Pulev hits 600,000 PPV views in UK alone ahead of potential Tyson Fury mega-fight
ANTHONY JOSHUA'S win over Kubrat Pulev hit over 600,000 buys on UK pay-per-view ahead of his potential mega-fight with Tyson Fury.
The Athletic claim AJ's ninth-round knockout over the Bulgarian to successfully defend his IBF title could ultimately reach 700k.
Yet the £24.95 record-equaling priced win over Pulev shifted less than half than the most bought UK PPVS ever - with Joshua occupying all of the top three slots.
The Olympic Gold medalist's last outing in the ring - his triumph over Andy Ruiz Jr broke Sky's record with more than 1.6million buys.
The monster rematch in Saudi Arabia eclipsed the previous record of 1.5m purchases - for AJ's thrilling win over Wladimir Klitschko in 2017.
While the Watford boxer's success over Joseph Parker a year later is down in third after selling 1.45m buys.
The 31-year-old's latest win has cleared the way for a potential two-fight deal worth a staggering £500million with Fury.
Eddie Hearn recently confirmed that the all-British heavyweight showdown between AJ and the Gypsy King has been verbally agreed.
An obstacle preventing the deal is the fact Oleksandr Usyk is currently the mandatory challenger for Joshua's WBO belt.
Hearn has previously admitted that both fighters could ditch their belts, from the four major sanctioning bodies, if they try to block the undisputed decider.
Hearn said: “We’ve just got to be a bit careful because you may be on the verge of saying: 'Lets just get rid of politics right now.
“Let’s just drop all the belts because if we lose one belt, we might as well lose them all. We will do whatever we can to make sure that every belt in boxing is on the line in the Tyson Fury fight.
“What we won’t be is held to ransom and we won’t let politics get involved in a fight that boxing needs.”