Bob Arum Won’t Attend Fury-Whyte Due To Covid 19

It’s arguably the biggest fight of the year for his promotion, but legendary Top Rank Boxing promoter Bob Arum won’t be at Wembley Stadium Saturday night for the WBC heavyweight title showdown between Tyson Fury and Dillian Whyte.

The 91 year old Arum announced Monday afternoon that he’s positive for Covid 19, experiencing symptoms and therefore, is unable to travel abroad for to see Fury’s return as champion to the U.K.

Excited to watch Tyson Fury defend his titles Saturday against Dillian Whyte in front of 94,000 fans at Wembley Stadium. Unfortunately, I will be unable to attend as I am recovering from mild COVID-19 symptoms. I’ll be cheering on The Gypsy King from home as I watch on ESPN+ PPV.

— Bob Arum (@BobArum) April 18, 2022

“Excited to watch Tyson Fury defend his titles Saturday against Dillian Whyte in front of 94,000 fans at Wembley Stadium. Unfortunately, I will be unable to attend as I am recovering from mild COVID-19 symptoms. I’ll be cheering on The Gypsy King from home as I watch on ESPN+ PPV,” Arum wrote on Twitter.

Arum and Top Rank are the U.S. based co-promoter of the unbeaten Fury. This along with his primary promoter from the beginning of his career, Frank Warren and Queensberry Promotions based in England. They took the lead in securing Fury’s two fight deal with former champ Deontay Wilder for the fights in February 2020 and their trilogy battle in  October of last year.

Then, it was Warren who won the rights on purse bid to promote Fury-Whyte for the staggering, all time record $41 million back in January.

Fury, who’s 31-0-1, is in the driver’s seat for the massive pay day that he’s getting for the Whyte bout because of his two wins over American Wilder, and the fact that this will be his first ever title defense in the U.K. Whyte is 28-2, but still in the position as the WBC’s top challenger, despite having been knocked out cold by a 40 year old Alexander Povetkin in August of 2020. Whyte later avenged the loss by stopping Povetkin in their March 2021 rematch.

The title bout of Fury-Whyte immediately sold over 90,000 tickets at Wembley, even without Whyte avoiding the opening press conference and not trying to hype it at all  on social media, etc.

Nonetheless, Warren and Queensberry successfully petitioned British authorities to free up another 4,000 seats for the famed venue and those sold immediately, as well.

Arum’s next significant bout for Top Rank is the Oscar Valdez-Shakur Stevenson unified super featherweight title bout for coming a week from Saturday on April 30th in Las Vegas, where his company his based.