The pair were due to face each other at the Tottenham Hotspur Stadium on June 20 but the coronavirus pandemic forced the clash to be cancelled. 

A new date for the clash has not to been announced yet but it’s likely going down in December with London’s O2 Arena as a possible location.

Hearn said: “We know AJ’s only going to fight once this year, so we want to give ourselves the best opportunity to bring in a crowd, and that would obviously be the later the better. But it’s still not a gimme at all. There’s still a very strong chance that AJ will have to fight behind closed doors. Bearing in mind he’s only going to fight once this year, I just feel as we might as well give ourselves every chance to have a crowd and that will be the first weekend of December. Their regulations comply with the government, so at the moment they’re closed. So they would need to open up. We’d need to get an understanding from the government what is allowed in arenas. Are you going to open at 50 per cent [capacity]? Are you going to open up 100 per cent? There’s a lot of work that has to go into that with the government and the O2 (Arena).”

The WBA, IBF and WBO heavyweight champion were due to meet IBF mandatory challenger Pulev, on June 20 at the Tottenham Hotspur Stadium, but due to the Coronavirus pandemic, the fight will now take place between October and December.

Joshua’s promoter Eddie Hearn says “With everything going on and the fact we have no idea yet about when we will be allowed crowds, and what size crowds, it won’t be the summer. I think it will be in the window between October and December. Sooner would be better than later because we don’t want it to be a year between fights (Joshua beat Andy Ruiz in December).”