Several fans are disappointed with the timings set for Anthony Joshua and Tyson Fury‘s ring walk for their scheduled fight at Cardiff’s Principality Stadium on December 11. While some suspect the move has been made to please the American viewers, many fear it interferes with their weekend routine.

“An application has been made to Cardiff Council for the ring walk for the Tyson Fury vs Anthony Joshua fight to take place at 1am; They would like the premises also open until 3.30am; It has been described as a ‘very limited, one-off occasion,” read an update from Sky Sports.

Records reveal event time as Friday, December 11, at 02:00 p.m. Eastern Time (ET). That roughly corresponds to 7 p.m. Greenwich Mean Time (GMT). Notably, Cardiff observes GMT during the winter months. So, the latest update places the ring walk 5–7 hours after the scheduled 7 p.m. start time.

This would not be unprecedented. Riyadh Season boxing events have featured unusually late local ring walks, with undercard extending well past midnight to align the main events with U.S. and U.K. television audiences.

Fury-Usyk’s fight began around 1 a.m. Riyadh time, while Joshua’s Riyadh events also featured post-midnight main events. The scheduling prioritized international broadcast windows over conventional local viewing hours.

Major boxing cards have sometimes been scheduled at unusual local hours to accommodate lucrative U.S. and international audiences.

Muhammad Ali-George Foreman’s 1974 “Rumble in the Jungle” began around 4 a.m. in Kinshasa for a 10 a.m. ET U.S. broadcast, while Ali-Joe Frazier’s “Thrilla in Manila” began around 10:45 a.m. to serve international television.

More recently, Canelo Alvarez-William Scull began around 6:20 a.m. in Riyadh on May 4, 2025, corresponding to Saturday night—U.S. primetime.

But for several fans, that history matters little.

Anthony Joshua-Tyson Fury’s late-night ring walk puts fans on the clock

Offering a measured take, one user wrote, “”This will actually make the fight worse. Science shows that your body can’t perform as well after midnight or at regular sleeping hours, even if you set your sleeping pattern to be later. They’ll look even more shot to bits than they already do. Fatigued, groggy, and lethargic.”

The comments stem from a few studies that suggest an early morning ring-walk, or for that matter fights, can challenge normal circadian rhythm – the sync between your body’s internal clock and your daily routine – because strength, power, and other performance measures often peak later in the day, although the individual body clock varies.

Training at competition time can help reduce those effects.

It must be noted, however, that claims such as elite camps universally reversing sleep schedules for 3-4 weeks, using 1-2 a.m. sparring, or tracking sleep deviations as direct predictors of resulting injuries are not firmly established.

“Re-engineering US-UK fights so it fits US times. Us then get introduced to early afternoon drinking. Look out for lots of beer and eating commercials,” a fan teased.

The mockery largely centers on the fact that a UK fight might traditionally happen at a convenient evening or nighttime for British audiences. If the fight is moved earlier to suit the U.S. primetime TV audience, then UK viewers may end up watching it in the early afternoon.

That also means that, given American TV coverage often includes advertising for beer, alcohol, and food, UK viewers are likely to see a lot of those commercials while watching the afternoon broadcast.

“I don’t get why it can’t be at a normal time on a Saturday. As if Americans wanna watch it, they can at 3pm their time rather than rush home from work to watch it on a Friday,” a user added.

“So 2 fighters from the UK likely now need to train outside of the UK to adjust to the time of their native land 🤷🏻‍♂️,” a fan mused, taking a more nationalistic view. That sentiment echoed in recent weeks as the dispute among the stakeholders over staging the fight at the Madison Square Garden in New York or Wembley Stadium in London continued before Cardiff emerged as a compromise.

A more practical concern emerged when a fan joked, “Friday night fight. How are people going to get to Cardiff on time after work 😆.” People may still be at work when the event starts. They need time to travel to Cardiff, potentially during Friday-evening traffic.

Public transport and roads can be particularly busy on Friday evenings. So people could potentially miss the opening fights or parts of the event.

Beyond the fans’ concerns, this is yet another issue surrounding what has been widely described as the biggest fight in British boxing history.

The earlier issues stemmed from the dispute between the organizers, while the focus has shifted toward fans’ expectations. That should provide some relief, given that the fight is finally in place. The timing is another related issue that could ultimately prove fleeting.