Anthony Joshua could pocket £75m from Tyson Fury blockbuster

Anthony Joshua could earn as much as £75m from his long-awaited heavyweight showdown with fellow Briton Tyson Fury in Cardiff on December 11.

The blockbuster bout, scheduled for the Principality Stadium, is expected to generate a total purse of about £150m ($198m), according to The Sun.

With neither fighter reportedly holding an advantage in the purse negotiations, Joshua and Fury are expected to split the prize pot equally, giving each boxer an estimated £75m ($99m).

If the figures materialise, the payday would represent the biggest purse of Joshua’s career and exceed the roughly £65m ($85m) he has previously earned for a single fight.

The Joshua-Fury contest has been years in the making, having previously been targeted when both fighters held major heavyweight titles.

Their proposed 2021 meeting failed to materialise after Fury was required to honour a contractual obligation to complete his trilogy with Deontay Wilder.

Both fighters subsequently faced Oleksandr Usyk, with the Ukrainian defeating Fury twice and Joshua twice.

The British rivals will now meet in Cardiff six years after their initial agreement, with the bout expected to become one of the biggest events in British boxing history.

The fight could have generated an even larger payday had it been staged in the United States, where Madison Square Garden in New York was reportedly considered as a potential venue.

Joshua, however, insisted that the contest be held in Britain, citing the role the country’s boxing system played in his career.

“British boxing gave me everything, it changed my life,” Joshua told SunSport.

“I was going down the wrong path until I found Sean Murphy and Johnny Oliver at Finchley ABC.

“And then Team GB in Sheffield – and all the amazing coaches that worked every day for the love of the sport.

“Not the money – because there was no money.

“It was the UK or nothing.”

The December 11 contest could also mark the final fight for either heavyweight, with both men approaching the latter stages of their careers.

There will reportedly be no rematch clause in the agreement, adding further significance to the highly anticipated encounter.