Honorable Turki Alalshikh revealed that he plans to reduce the PPV costs of his Riyadh Season events to a manageable amount, which will help increase the interest in boxing.
In the UK, Turki wants to drop PPV costs to £20 and $20 worldwide. Turki’s campaign kicks off next month between light heavyweight champions Artur Beterbiev and Dmitry Bivol on October 12. The event will sell for £15 in the UK. In the US, that fight is already being shown for free to subscribers on ESPN+.
What is not clear is whether the PPV costs will be reduced for the fights under Shakur Stevenson and Joe Cordina, which were taken out of the main event of Beterbiev-Bivol on the card of October 12 in Riyadh and will be sold on DAZN pay-per-view. .
It will look bad if Shakur’s fight against low ranked contender Cordina is sold $70+ on PPV. Promoter Eddie Hearn did a number on Shakur by choosing Cordina for the PPV instead of feeding the runner to the wolves by matching him with Abdullah Mason, Raymond Muratalla, or William Zepeda.
US fans were upset that the undercard was cut from the main event and put on the PPV. While British fans love low-key fights, Americans see low-level fights from top to bottom, including a train wreck between boring, defensive-minded Shakur Stevenson and Joe Cordina, a striker who was knocked out last May.
Die-hard boxing fans see the fight as a sly ploy to illegally boost Shakur’s low-profile fame in order to increase interest in seeing him fight Gervonta ‘Tank’ Davis in 2025. Shakur’s level has dropped in his last two fights, and the US fans don’t want it. watching his serious Mayweather-esque retro-level fights.
Expanding the Fanbase
“People [watch] illegally because the price is high. This is in the future and will not be built into the box. If I fight well for a good amount, I will increase the fans,” said Honorable Turki Alalshikh on the talksport Boxing YouTube channel.
This will be great for fans watching Riyadh season events. However, it will not change the cost structure of other boxing events put on by major US promoters, who will likely continue to sell their cards for $70 to $90. It’s not possible to grow sports with high PPV costs and almost all good fights are stuck behind a paywall.
Shakur-Cordina undercard for DAZN PPV
– Chris Eubank Jr. vs. Kamil Szeremeta
– Fabio Wardley vs. Frazer Clarke
– Jai Opetaia vs. Jack Massey
– Ben Whittaker vs. Liam Cameron
– Skye Nicholson vs. Raven Chapman
– Mohammad Alamel vs. Jesus Gonzalez
Those are local fights, and American boxing fans don’t want to see any of those low-level matches, or a bad big event between Shakur and Cordina.
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