Exclusive Dillian Whyte interview: 'There will be no step-aside. I’ve waited long enough'

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Dillian Whyte insists no amount of money could persuade the former Brixton bad boy to "step aside" and allow Tyson Fury and Anthony Joshua to contest the richest fight in British boxing history. It will have been one thousand days waiting as the No1 challenger for the World Boxing Council crown when Whyte faces the Russian Alexander Povetkin on August 22, behind closed doors in the grounds of promoter Eddie Hearn's Matchroom Boxing headquarters in the Essex countryside. It is 15 miles from the O2 Arena where Whyte has made his name in the last two years, but more to the point, an interminable distance waiting for his moment on the fully-lit stage of success. It is some resolve Whyte has shown, with an ambition of becoming a heavyweight world champion running deep in his blood. But he has now become the immoveable object and the obstacle standing between the much-hyped, apparently "agreed" pair of fights between Fury and Joshua, sometime, somewhere, in 2021, and a contest that could gross an estimated £150m. Whyte, speaking from his training base in Portugal where he has been ensconced during the coronavirus pandemic lockdown, where he has been tested regularly for COVID-19 and voluntary anti-doping tests, insisted: “Nah, there's to be no step-aside. I’ve waited long enough. I’m not getting any younger, I’m getting older. I just want to be world champion and reign and unify. So the sooner I can get the world title the sooner I can go about that. So, no I’m not looking to step aside at all.” Whyte's case was strengthened on Sunday when WBC president Mauricio Sulaiman confirmed that Fury's world-title fight with Whyte "could happen" this year if the American Deontay Wilder decides not to go into the trilogy fight with Fury for the WBC belt on December 19, with reports that he is recuperating from bicep surgery. Sulaiman told Sky Sports: "It could happen if they reach an agreement. The third fight [Fury-Wilder] and then the mandatory must take place. The WBC's position and ruling is as I stated."

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