‘The tickets should’ve went on sale a lot faster’: Floyd Mayweather tries to explain poor sales after fans fail to turn up for his victory over Aaron Chalmers at the O2 Arena – with the entire top tier of 20,000-seat venue closed
- American fighter stepped into the ring in the United Kingdom for the first time
- Despite that, the event seemingly failed to drum up much interest among fans
- Footage from the event showed a near-empty O2 Arena on Saturday evening
Floyd Mayweather claimed tickets going on sale too late was to blame for the poor attendance at his fight with Aaron Chalmers.
Mayweather, 46, made his long-awaited debut appearance in a UK ring on Saturday but despite that the fight failed to drum up much interest or attention and it was reflected in the attendance on the night.
He cruised to a decision victory but the entire top tier of the 20,000-seat arena was shut off.
Speaking in his post-fight press conference, he said: ‘We did this in one month – not even four weeks.
‘I think the tickets should’ve went on sale a lot faster.
Floyd Mayweather claimed tickets going on sale too late was to blame for the poor attendance
Footage from the event at the O2 Arena showed swathes of empty seats during the bout
Empty seats could be seen all around the arena with the promoters failing to drum up interest
It almost seemed farcical at times that the bout was taking place in front of such a small crowd
‘My new team is still learning. I have got to take my hat off to them, it’s not their fault.
‘It’s just when we fight in the US, as soon as we announce the fight, tickets are on sale.
‘Here, we announced the fight and the tickets didn’t go on sale until a week or two weeks later.’
Mayweather added: ‘I don’t point fingers. We work together as a team.
‘When you buy tickets over here, you don’t really want to spend money.
‘In America we don’t mind spending money.’
The unbeaten American has engaged in a series of extremely lucrative exhibition fights since his retirement in 2017, which have largely taken place in the Middle East.
The ‘Royal Pain’ event was painfully delayed after a poor attendance at the start of proceedings, combined with reports of thousands of unsold tickets at the O2 Arena.
Mayweather made light work of Chalmers but it failed to attract paying fans on the night