'Ten years in the making': Fury and Joshua are mostly smiles as blockbuster fight finally looms

LONDON (AP) — Tyson Fury and Anthony Joshua had mostly smiles and friendly banter to exchange as they finally took the stage together Wednesday to promote the heavyweight fight that boxing fans have waited a decade for.

The punches will come later, on Dec. 11 in Cardiff when the two former two-time world champions square off for the first time, and on UK soil to boot.

“Ten years in the making,” Joshua said at a press conference in London, the first time the two fighters squared off since the fight was announced last week. “We’re here now … it had to happen at some stage and there’s no better time than now.”

It is being billed as the biggest fight in British boxing history. The only question is whether it comes too late to settle the dispute over who is the better fighter.

Fury is 38 and has come out of retirement a handful of times already. Joshua turns 37 in two weeks and his only fights since losing his IBF world title clash with Daniel Dubois in 2024 were against YouTuber Jake Paul and Kristian Prenga.

“People say is it too late? (Expletive) too late,” Fury said. ”It’s the icing on the cake.”

Both men praised Turki Alalshikh, the chairman of the Saudi General Entertainment Authority and president of the Saudi Boxing Federation, for finally making the fight happen.

Alalshikh said he wanted to stage it at Wembley Stadium in London but settled for Cardiff because he couldn’t get permission to have the iconic venue stay open until 2 a.m.

“In the end, Wales delivered,” Alalshikh said. “And still it is UK.”

The prize money for the fight has not been announced, but British media reports have put the collective purse at close to $200 million.

"They’re getting extremely well paid.” said Frank Warren, the promoter in Fury's camp.

Tickets go on sale Oct. 9.

And the fighters are saving their heavy punches for the big event. The press conference was mostly full of smiles and laughter as the two exchanged a few verbal barbs about a famous sparring session more than 10 years ago, when Joshua was still an amateur.

A few hundred fans had been granted tickets and a vast majority were loudly in Joshua’s camp.

But it was Fury who did most of the talking, although he mainly had good things to say about his opponent.

“He’s been a role model and a poster boy for British boxing for years. I find myself defending my archrival to fans I meet in the street,” Fury said. “That aside, obviously we’re here to fight, and fight we will.”

That’s all boxing fans — especially in Britain — have wanted to see for so long.

“I know in pubs, people have had proper fights about who’s going to win between me and Tyson,” Joshua said. “I know family members have fell out with each other about who’s going to win … I’m just happy to be here, fighting, and fulfilling my destiny before I depart this world.”

Fury also pointed out the vastly contrasting physiques and styles of the two fighters.

“I stand here today as the most awkwardly built world heavyweight champion in the history of sport,” Fury said. “I’m a bald, fat, bearded, ugly, slow and ponderous, all of the above.”

At which point Joshua cut in: “It’s true.”

Fury then continued: “And we’ve got this guy here. He’s carved in stone like an Olympian, from marble. But every time he gets cracked on the jaw he falls over.”

Fury had less nice things to say about Eddie Hearn, the promoter in Joshua's camp, and briefly tried to stoke a bit of animosity by making fun of his ring opponent having referred to himself as “the landlord” in the buildup.

“Now it’s come time to collect the rent, and I’m not (expletive) paying,” Fury said. “Because I’m No. 1.”

The two fighters also bickered over why Fury's name is first in the “Fury vs. Joshua” promotional material for the bout — which will be shown on Netflix — and whether the fight should be staged in Britain.

But they never seemed close to getting physical as they squared up on stage, and Fury is already preparing to take his opponent out for a beer after the bout.

“I don't know if you're a a drinking man, but I hope that after this fight we can have a pint of Guinness together. Win, lose or draw," Fury said. "Have a fight first, then have a beer. How does that sound?"

Replied Joshua: “I don't know if I can trust you.”

AP sports: https://apnews.com/sports

Tyson Fury, left, and Anthony Joshua, right, face off after a Press Conference in London, Wednesday, Sept. 30, 2026, to promote their upcoming fight which will take place at the Principality Stadium in Cardiff on Dec.11.(AP Photo/Kin Cheung)

Tyson Fury during a Press Conference with Anthony Joshua in London, Wednesday, Sept. 30, 2026, to promote their upcoming fight which will take place at the Principality Stadium in Cardiff on Dec.11.(AP Photo/Kin Cheung)

Tyson Fury, left, and Anthony Joshua, right, pose together after a Press Conference in London, Wednesday, Sept. 30, 2026, to promote their upcoming fight which will take place at the Principality Stadium in Cardiff on Dec.11.(AP Photo/Kin Cheung)

Tyson Fury, left, and Anthony Joshua, right, face off after a Press Conference in London, Wednesday, Sept. 30, 2026, to promote their upcoming fight which will take place at the Principality Stadium in Cardiff on Dec.11.(AP Photo/Kin Cheung)

NASHVILLE, Tenn. (AP) — Tennessee's execution of Christa Gail Pike for a murder she committed at age 18 was halted Wednesday shortly before it was set to begin, as a court sought to review whether her allegations of childhood sexual abuse were fully considered at her sentencing.

Pike, now 50, and her boyfriend were convicted of the 1995 stabbing and beating of 19-year-old Colleen Slemmer, their classmate at a job training facility in Knoxville.

The 6th Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals halted Pike's execution on a 2-1 vote about an hour before the scheduled execution time, as witnesses and others gathered at the Riverbend Maximum Security Institution in Nashville. Tennessee has not executed a woman in at least 200 years.

The case garnered widespread attention at the time of the killing in part because a pentagram that was carved on Slemmer’s body and other elements of the crime stoked fears of Satan worship during the “satanic panic” of the 1980s and 1990s.

Tennessee’s attorney general immediately appealed the stay to the U.S. Supreme Court. Witnesses and media remained at the prison while the high court considered whether to allow the execution to proceed.

The state's execution order expires at midnight, said Kelley Henry, a Nashville-based attorney experienced with Tennessee death penalty law. If time runs out and the stay is lifted, the Tennessee Supreme Court would need to set a new execution date.

In its appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court, the attorney general's office wrote that halting the execution at the last moment traumatized Slemmer’s family and rewarded “abusive delay tactics” by Pike’s attorneys.

Pike does not deny committing the killing, but her supporters argue the state should consider her age at the time, her mental illness and her allegations severe sexual abuse that included being raped from the time she was a toddler.

“It is inconceivable that in the 21st century, the criminal justice system is poised to execute a survivor of rape and child sexual abuse whose jury never had the opportunity to consider those facts in weighing the defendant’s moral culpability,” her attorneys wrote in a filing to the U.S. Supreme Court.

As the execution date drew near, Pike's case renewed debate over the death penalty for young offenders.

Assistant Federal Defender Stephen Ferrell said Pike’s death sentence is an outlier because other 18-year-olds in Tennessee have had such sentences vacated.

After the killing, Pike was diagnosed with bipolar disorder and post-traumatic stress disorder. In her clemency petition, she said she only wanted to fight Slemmer but killed her in a frenzied attack when she couldn’t “put the brakes on.”

“I was a mentally ill 18-year-old kid. It took me numerous years to even realize the gravity of what I’d done. Even more to accept how many lives I affected. I took the life of someone’s child, sister, friend. It sickens me now to think I had the ability to commit such a crime,” Pike said in a statement.

Slemmer’s mother wants the lethal injection to go forward, saying she has waited decades to see Pike’s sentence carried out.

“Every time I think about it, I think about Colleen feeling that pain and trying to get up and run,” May Martinez told The Associated Press in a telephone interview on Saturday.

Martinez said a group helped raise money so she and her husband could travel from Florida to witness the execution. She didn't respond to a message Wednesday after the execution was halted.

Martinez said her daughter's age also should matter in deciding Pike's fate.

“Not a day goes by, or a minute goes by that I do not think about Colleen. Holidays are the worst,” she said, noting that her daughter would have turned 51 earlier in September.

The killing rocked the city of Knoxville. Prosecutors said Pike, fearing Slemmer was trying to steal her boyfriend, lured her to a wooded area on Jan. 12, 1995. Pike cut Slemmer with a box cutter and beat her with a large chunk of asphalt. Shipp, Pike’s boyfriend, has admitted that he was the one who carved a pentagram, a star-shaped symbol associated with Satan, into her body.

Shipp was 17 when the crime happened and received a sentence of life in prison with the possibility of parole. Pike was the only one sentenced to death.

Tennessee has not executed a woman for at least 200 years, according to Robin M. Maher, executive director of the Death Penalty Information Center. Older records can be spotty, though, so it’s difficult to know precise details about the last woman who was put to death there.

Since the Supreme Court reinstated the death penalty in 1976, 18 women have been put to death in the U.S., representing about 1% of all executions, according to the center.

Most recently, Missouri in 2023 executed Amber McLaughlin for a 2003 killing, in what is believed to be the first execution of a transgender woman in the U.S. In 2021, the federal government executed Lisa Montgomery, marking the first time in nearly seven decades that the U.S. government put a female inmate to death.

Pike would be the 30th person executed in the U.S. this year after Florida carried out an execution on Tuesday.

Associated Press journalists Jeffrey Collins in Columbia, South Carolina, and Ed White in Detroit contributed to this report.

May Martinez, left, mother of murder victim Colleen Slemmer, walks out of Riverbend Maximum Security Institution during a stay of the planned execution of Christa Pike, Wednesday, Sept. 30, 2026, in Nashville, Tenn. (AP Photo/George Walker IV)

Leslie Brown, right, stands with others in the area reserved for people in favor to the death penalty outside Riverbend Maximum Security Institution before the planned execution of Christa Pike, Wednesday, Sept. 30, 2026, in Nashville, Tenn. (AP Photo/George Walker IV)

Kathleen Walter prays in the area reserved for people opposed to the death penalty outside Riverbend Maximum Security Institution before the planned execution of Christa Pike, Wednesday, Sept. 30, 2026, in Nashville, Tenn. (AP Photo/George Walker IV)

Abraham Bonowitz speaks during a March 4 Mercy protest against the death penalty at the Tennessee State Capitol, Sunday, Sept. 27, 2026, in Nashville, Tenn. ahead of the Sept. 30th scheduled execution of Christa Pike. (AP Photo/George Walker IV)

Alonzo Hughes participates in a March 4 Mercy protest against the death penalty at the Tennessee State Capitol, Sunday, Sept. 27, 2026, in Nashville, Tenn. ahead of the Sept. 30th scheduled execution of Christa Pike. (AP Photo/George Walker IV)

In this image from video provided by WBIR-TV, Christa Pike cries after being sentenced to death on March 30, 1996 in Knoxville, Tenn. (WBIR-TV via AP)

This photo provided by the Tennessee Department of Correction shows Christa Pike on Jan. 12, 2023. (TDOC via AP)