Most fighters in Mahmoud Charr’s position would be rooting for negotiations to fail between Tyson Fury and Anthony Joshua.

Yet, even the former secondary WBA titleholder is rooting—in his own way—for things to steer in the right direction.

An all-British world heavyweight championship remains in discussion, despite Fury’s claim that his own deadline has passed without a deal in place and that he’s ready to move on to the next one. That plan would be a showdown with Charr (33-4, 19KOs), who followed the lead of Fury in using social media to openly mock Joshua.

“Anthony Puss-ua. You have the chance to fight the best, WBC heavyweight Tyson Fury. Sign the paper,” Charr stated Monday on his Instagram channel. “If not, go out and let real men fight. Tyson Fury, come on. Let’s go.”

Fury (32-0-1, 23KOs) has hinted all along that Charr (33-4, 19KOs) was always the backup plan if Joshua (24-3, 22KOs) didn’t comply with terms within his Monday deadline. Promoters for Manchester’s Fury and Watford’s Joshua—Queensberry Promotions and Matchroom Boxing, respectively—remain hard at work in efforts to salvage the long-awaited battle of hulking British heavyweights.

Should a deal be reached, Fury would make the second defense of his lineal and WBC heavyweight championship in a fight that would take place on December 3 at Principality Stadium in Cardiff, Wales. The fight—which would carry a 60/40 purse split in Fury’s favor—would grant Joshua the opportunity to become a three-time heavyweight titlist, even as he is coming off back-to-back losses to Ukraine’s Oleksandr Usyk (20-0, 13KOs) in their pair of WBA/IBF/IBO/WBO heavyweight title fights.

Eddie Hearn, Joshua’s career-long promoter, previously noted to the UK media that he found Fury’s Monday deadline to be unrealistic, as they just received the contract offer and still have far too much to discuss. Among the topics to discuss are the various platforms working together to present the fight. Fury is under contract with BT Sport in the UK and ESPN+ in the U.S., while Joshua recently signed a long-term deal as a global ambassador for DAZN.

Hearn’s Matchroom Boxing and Frank Warren’s Queensberry Promotions remain hopeful of a deal being reached, a welcomed sign of optimism from the longtime promotional rivals.

However, Fury is not wasting a moment in insisting that Joshua is out and that he has moved on to Charr, a 37-year-old Lebanon-born heavyweight of Syrian descent who is based out of Cologne, Germany who has won his last five starts. The run included a lengthy but bizarre WBA ‘World’ (Regular) heavyweight title reign that lasted more than three years but which didn’t feature a single title defense.

Charr claimed the secondary belt in a November 2017 points win over Alexander Ustinov. He was due to defend against Fres Oquendo, only to test positive for a banned substance which canceled the fight—but which he was able to successfully protest in claiming broken chain of custody over the handling of the tested samples.

The plan then shifted to defending against then-interim titlist Trevor Bryan, which fell through on several occasions and ending with Charr being stripped of his title for failure to secure a travel visa to properly defend his belt. The matter serves as the subject of an ongoing lawsuit filed by Charr against the WBA and Don King, Bryan’s Hall of Fame promoter whom Charr and his team allege to have colluded with the sanctioning body to freeze him out.

Meanwhile, two wins have followed since that ordeal—a second-round knockout of then-unbeaten cult favorite Chris Lovejoy last May in Cologne, and a third-round knockout of Nikola Milacic this past May 28 in Hamburg. No firm plans are in place for a next fight beyond being the failsafe in the event Fury-Joshua doesn’t take place.

“I still believe the fight will take place between Fury and AJ,” Erol Ceylan, Charr’s promoter, told BoxingScene.com. “But we will be ready if anybody calls us.”

Fury insists that day has already arrived.

“Looking forward to fighting a man who wants to fight & has fire & desire,” Fury said Monday on social media, referring to Charr. “Fought some of the best fighters & now stepping up again! Get in there Charr.”

The last remaining piece of the puzzle would be for Charr to magically make his way into the top 15 of the WBC heavyweight rankings. He is currently ranked number nineteen, though these matters have a wonderful way of working out once such a fight is in play. Charr’s team can lobby for a more favorable—and title-eligible—ranking at any point, including the upcoming WBC convention in early November.

Jake Donovan is a senior writer for BoxingScene.com. Twitter: @JakeNDaBox