In keeping with most aspects of modern life, boxing continued to become an increasingly online affair in 2024. Like shopping, ordering food, communicating, making money, and watching films, the encouraged and easiest way to follow the sport was from afar and through a screen, with convenience prioritised over both intimacy and experience.
In boxing, the shift in consumer habits has naturally been accelerated by the growing influence of Saudi Arabia in recent years. As boxing’s version of big tech, Saudi money has simply made life easier for those within the sport and those with an inclination to watch it. It has alleviated the pressure on promoters, who no longer even need to promote, and it also helps to deliver consumers the fights they have always wanted to see, reducing in the process the frustration we once accepted as a symptom of following the sport. Now, if a fight is big enough, there is a very good chance it will happen thanks to Saudi money and everyone’s favourite sugar daddy, Turki Alalshikh. One click and it’s ordered – almost.
For a sport prone to procrastination, this is a welcome development, only it is not without its drawbacks. Consider, after all, the fact that now all the biggest fights will likely take place in Saudi Arabia if they are to take place at all. Consider, too, the long-term impact this shortsightedness may have on other territories around the world if the fan bases in those territories become accustomed to watching the best fights through their screen at home rather than in person. Do those other territories in time become the forlorn high streets and empty shopping malls of the boxing world?
In truth, it isn’t hard to imagine a scenario in which people forget what it is like to attend a big fight in person and instead experience the “community” of a fight via ghastly watchalongs and reaction videos. Soon, as with film and cinemas, there may even come a time when the next generation of boxing fans view fights as merely content; that is, something to watch and consume, not something to feel or experience. To them, there may be no difference between watching a great fight at home, on an app, and attending one in person. Think, for a second, of the convenience. Think of the perks. At home they can order, from a different app, their evening meal and have it delivered to their door in time for the opening bell. At home there is the option to switch over and watch something else should the fight they have paid to watch fail to live up to expectations or produce the desired storyline.
In 2024, as well as its own fight mall, Riyadh Season became, in many ways, its own TV show. It featured a consistent roster of characters and basic, easily understood plots and from their homes the rest of the world watched, having been either priced out or put off from attending the live recording. Through our screens we all enjoyed what we saw, despite the lack of noise in the arena, and each time a new episode arrived we found ourselves coming back for more.
All that mattered to us was the quality of the product. That it had changed in terms of how it was delivered, and how the experience felt, was irrelevant when the product was so good. Where else, after all, would we be able to watch Tyson Fury and Oleksandr Usyk finally decide the fate of the heavyweight division? Who else was willing to put up the money to get Russian light heavyweights Artur Beterbiev and Dmitry Bivol in a ring at the same time? Even beneath that kind of level, there were countless fights being made to satisfy fans who have long been starved of quality action despite forking out obscene amounts of money for either tickets or pay-per-view offerings.
Suddenly, although restricted from attending, we had some reward for our loyalty. We had the fights we wanted to see and sitting ringside we had the man with the power to make them. The only negative in all this, as far as the viewing experience, was that for most of us these fights would be observed through a screen – either a big one or a small one – and we would often feel more like a voyeur watching other people’s fun through windows, or listening through walls, than an active participant in the frivolities.
Then again, the role of voyeur or cuckold is certainly not one with which boxing fans, and people involved in boxing, are unfamiliar. Even in Saudi Arabia, where all the fun is had, most of the people witnessing this fun at ringside, be it in press row or row A, are currently adopting similar roles – dutifully, excellently.
That is all fine, of course, but occasionally a fight comes along that needs to be loved and deserves a more personal touch. A heavyweight fight between Fury and Anthony Joshua, for example, is not only a fight that should have happened years ago but now surely only makes sense if it is staged in England, where both men were born. Anything other than that would be a disappointment, particularly when you consider the fact both men, Fury and Joshua, are coming off defeats and therefore the fight’s appeal has to some extent diminished.
Frankly, it could be argued it is a fight Britain now needs given that big-ticket main events were few and far between in 2024. There were decent ones, like Fabio Wardley-Frazer Clarke in March, Jack Catterall-Josh Taylor in May, and Chris Billam-Smith-Richard Riakporhe in June, but nothing of the sort to indicate that boxing in the UK is currently thriving or in better health than it has been in previous years. In fact, the biggest fight in Britain this year was a Riyadh Season production at Wembley Stadium involving Joshua and Daniel Dubois, which attracted either 80,000 or 90,000 fans – depending on what you believe – and succeeded in making a lot of rich men even richer.
If, in 2025, something similar were to happen with Joshua and Fury, it would come as a welcome relief to those concerned that big fights will be exclusive to Riyadh in the future. It would also represent a shot in the arm for a fan base responsible for the popularity Fury and Joshua have enjoyed since turning pro, as well a call to arms to get active, leave the house, and make some noise. The fight, after all, now probably needs it. Moreover, the sport needs it.
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