Tickets Priced up to £13,000 for Cardiff’s All-British Showdown All Gone in One Hour
IF there were any doubts about the appetite for Fury versus Joshua, today’s ticket sale appears to have answered them.
Around 80,000 tickets for the Principality Stadium showdown sold out within an hour of going on general sale, with more than 500,000 people reportedly joining the online queue.
Prices ranged from £88.50 to an extraordinary £13,128 including booking fees, yet demand still massively outstripped the number of seats available.
Resale listings began appearing almost immediately, some at dramatically inflated prices.
It means that more than two months before fight night, Cardiff’s huge December heavyweight showdown is already effectively a sell-out — despite the planned 1am ring walks and the licensing application still required to accommodate the unusually late finish.
Cardiff has hosted some memorable nights of boxing, but Tyson Fury versus Anthony Joshua could turn out to be unlike anything the Welsh capital has experienced before.
Details surrounding the heavyweight showdown at Principality Stadium revealed that organisers are planning for the two fighters to make their ring walks at around 1am, with the stadium potentially remaining open until 3.30am.
There is, however, one important hurdle still to clear.
Millennium Stadium Plc has submitted an application to Cardiff Council seeking a temporary variation to the stadium’s premises licence specifically for the fight.
The application asks for permitted hours for boxing and wrestling, live and recorded music, alcohol sales and late-night refreshment to be extended until 3am for what is described as a very limited, one-off occasion.
The proposed schedule would see a short live music performance immediately before the fighters enter the arena at around 1am, while spectators could remain inside the stadium until approximately 3.30am. The roof is also expected to remain closed throughout the event.
It means that although the event is officially being staged on Friday, December 11, the punches in the main event will actually be thrown during the early hours of Saturday morning.
The unusual timing reflects the enormous international interest in a contest British boxing supporters have waited more than a decade to see.
Fury and Joshua have both been heavyweight world champions and have dominated the British boxing landscape for much of the past decade, yet somehow their paths have never crossed in a professional ring.
Now Cardiff will finally provide the stage.
The Principality Stadium has confirmed that a full evening of boxing will precede the headline contest, although details of the undercard have still to be announced, with Netflix carrying the event live around the world. The stadium’s maximum capacity for major events is around 80,000, making the fight one of the biggest boxing occasions ever staged in Wales.
The 1am timing should also make the contest much more attractive to viewers in North America, placing one of British boxing’s biggest-ever fights in a favourable evening television slot across the Atlantic.
But it also creates an extraordinary prospect for Cardiff.
Tens of thousands of spectators could be emerging from Principality Stadium at two, three or even later in the morning, turning the city centre into something approaching an overnight sporting festival.
Transport, policing, stewarding, hospitality and the movement of such a large crowd through central Cardiff will inevitably require considerable planning.
The licence application remains subject to the normal consultation process, with representations accepted until November 3. If no relevant objections are received, the council must grant the application; if representations are made, the matter can proceed to a licensing hearing.
So the proposed 1am ring walk should currently be regarded as the plan rather than an unconditional certainty.
What is certain is that interest in the fight has moved up another level.
Demand was through the roof when tickets and hospitality packages went on sale at 12 noon today, Friday, October 9, through the official Principality Stadium channels.
Cardiff has already staged major Joshua fights, while the stadium’s retractable roof and city-centre location have made it particularly suited to huge winter boxing occasions.
This one, however, promises something different again.
Fury against Joshua has spent years appearing to be the fight that British boxing might never actually get.
Now not only is it heading for Wales, but Cardiff could find itself staging the climax of the contest long after most of the rest of the country has gone to bed.
For one night at least, the Welsh capital looks set to become the centre of the boxing world — after midnight.
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Did Ewe Know?
The Principality Stadium has an impressive heavyweight history of its own. Anthony Joshua has already fought there twice, defeating Carlos Takam in 2017 and Joseph Parker in 2018, while the former National Stadium on the same Cardiff site hosted Lennox Lewis against Frank Bruno in their famous 1993 heavyweight title fight.