Matchroom promoter Eddie Hearn has commented on the recent announcement of a new boxing league formed by Turki Alalshikh and Dana White.
The partnership between Alalshikh and White was revealed on Wednesday, with both promising to significantly outperform existing boxing promotions.
UFC president Dana White has long expressed his desire to get involved in boxing and restructure the sport completely.
It seems his new venture with Alalshikh, who is the chairman of Saudi Arabia’s General Entertainment Authority, aims to achieve this goal.
While their initial focus is to establish a boxing league that provides a platform for emerging fighters, their broader ambition appears to be much larger.
In a brief interview with the Ring Magazine, White reiterated his intention to eliminate boxing’s four major sanctioning bodies – the WBC, IBF, WBO, and WBA.
Instead, the head of the UFC wants to introduce a single championship belt per weight division and create a unified and recognized ranking system.
This plan is unsurprisingly unwelcome news to figures like WBC president Mauricio Sulaiman, who has stated his resistance to these proposed changes.
For other boxing promoters, the alliance between Alalshikh and White could also pose a threat, given Alalshikh’s confidence in White’s vision.
The new Saudi-backed boxing promotion, supported by the combat sports giant TKO, is expected to secure a significant broadcasting agreement with ESPN.
Therefore, while promoters like Hearn and Frank Warren currently benefit from Riyadh Season events, their future involvement in Alalshikh’s projects is uncertain.
However, Hearn has indicated his willingness to collaborate with White, while also emphasizing that Matchroom will continue to thrive even without further Saudi investment.
“Would I like to work with Dana White? Yes, absolutely,” Eddie Hearn stated.
“We have a good relationship, and he’s a very intelligent person. I don’t have enough information about the league to know how or if we will be involved.”
“We are very satisfied with our relationship with Alalshikh. If it were to end tomorrow, we would still have a substantial business with 35 events annually, worldwide.”
“But we enjoy working with Riyadh Season and Alalshikh.”
