Spence: Everybody sees Crawford held up negotiations, didn’t want the fight
Errol Spence Jr now believes Terence Crawford never really wanted to fight this year.
Yesterday, Terence Crawford’s decision to fight David Avanesyan next in a “BLK Prime” pay-per-view main event on Dec. 10 stole some negativity away from Tyson Fury’s decision to face Derek Chisora a third time, but that’s about the only good way anyone could spin it, and you’d have to be connected to the Fury vs Chisora fight.
Fans, of course, were hoping to see Crawford fight Errol Spence Jr in an undisputed welterweight championship fight, which was first anticipated to happen on Nov. 19, then that fell apart, then a new date of Feb. 4 was floated, and ultimately, we’ve come to Crawford vs Avanesyan and Spence vs, well, someone.
Spence (28-0, 22 KO), as you’d expect, is laying the blame firmly on the Crawford side, just as Crawford is doing the other way around.
From the Dallas Morning News:
“I don’t know who (Avanesyan) is. ... Everybody see now who is holding the fight up. He has been. This, I guess, was in his back pocket. He been stalling just for this.”
Spence added that he doesn’t believe this was anything to do with Crawford (38-0, 29 KO) wanting a tune-up, because he could have done that this past spring, around the time Spence fought Ugas.
There remains hope, among some at least, that Spence vs Crawford can finally happen in perhaps the summer of 2023, but Spence is also floating the idea of simply moving up to 154 lbs, which would leave three welterweight belts vacant