Ben Shalom says Eddie Hearn 'will say whatever suits his thing' after Zuffa and Sky comparison

The promoter said he was up against "DAZN and Warren and Saudi" at Sky with "no Saudi money" and "no sugar daddies", and that Hearn will "never be able to admit" what he has done in the sport.

Ben Shalom has told iFL TV that Eddie Hearn "will say whatever suits his thing", in an interview that raised Hearn's comparison between Zuffa and Shalom's work at Sky.

"Hearn will say whatever suits his thing, ever, you know," Shalom said. "Anything that he says in an interview is usually for serving a purpose."

The interviewer brought up a clip of Hearn talking about Dana White in which he made a reference to Shalom, who said he did not know which piece was meant. After Shalom's reply, the interviewer spelled out the line for viewers: "What he said was he said that Zuffa haven't done 10% of what you produced for Sky."

Shalom said he knew at the time that he would not get the credit for what he did at Sky "because I was so young". He said: "I was up against DAZN and Warren and Saudi, the biggest budgets in the world. It will only be in time where people see what an unbelievable job I did." He said he did it "from a standing start with nothing, with no Saudi money, with no public company, with no sugar daddies".

In the same answer, without naming anyone, he said "the reason why they won't succeed, and I mean this in the most polite way, is that you have to really live this game". He went on: "They say you can't play boxing as a fighter. You also can't as a promoter." He added that "it doesn't matter how much money they have".

Of Hearn, Shalom said: "It's a unique position being a promoter, and there's not many people that can relate to certain things. And he knows, he'll be one of the few people on the planet, he'll never be able to admit it, that knows what the f*** I've done in this sport."

Hearn has called Zuffa Boxing "a laughingstock of the sport" and said he would like to be responsible for its decline "and potentially the extinction within 10 months". He also wants a public debate with White over White's role in Tyson Fury vs Anthony Joshua on 11 December at Principality Stadium in Cardiff.

READ NEXTEddie Hearn wants 'back-and-forth debate' with Dana White at Fury vs Joshua press conferenceRead the next story →

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