By William Mackay: Unbelievably, heavyweight Tyson Fury (8-0, 7 KO’s) will be fighting next week on the undercard of the Bernard Dunne vs. Poonsawat Kratingdaenggym fight against a still to be determined opponent on September 26th at The O2, in Dublin, Ireland. Fury was looking to fight for the Irish heavyweight title, but it looks as if he’s had no takers and will have to settle for another lesser opponent to fight.
Fury, 21, fought last weekend, beating big John McDermott by a controversial 10-round decision in Brentwood. The decision angered a great many British fans, who saw McDermott as the winner in that fight. Fury isn’t shy to admit that he didn’t fight well, saying “I wasn’t happy with my performance against McDermott.”
Fury points out that he ended up overtraining for the fight by going to Germany and sparring everyday there, from eight to ten rounds each day. Fury looked quite a bit lighter against McDermott than he had been in previous fights. Fury’s weight for the McDermott fight was 247, whereas in his last fight previous to that in July against Aleksandres Selezens, Fury weighed 260.
Fury appeared too light, and weak against McDermott. Indeed, Fury’s punches lacked the usual power that they normally have and he appeared to look like a fighter that had left his best in the gym rather than bringing it with him to the fight. Despite seeing his performance as less than impressive, Fury feels that he still won the fight but not by the wide margin that referee Terry O’Conner scored it.
Fury feels that he won the bout by a six to three score. He thinks that the commentary on television was “biased” for his fight with McDermott. It did appear that the commentators felt that McDermott was winning most of the rounds and were, naturally, letting the TV viewers know who they felt was winning the rounds. Whether this unconsciously crept into the minds of the viewers, causing them to get the same impression is unknown.
However, the crowd was firmly behind McDermott, since it was fought in Essex where he lives, and cheering loudly each time that he would throw a punch. Fury, however, points out that he McDermott was fighting well, possibly at the highest point of his game, whereas Fury felt that he wasn’t in the best of shape that he could have been. He surmises that if he comes into the best condition possible, he’ll easily beat McDermott by knockout.
Fury feels that he was wearing McDermott out in the 9th and 10th rounds of the fight, and that if it had been a 12 round fight, he thinks he could have stopped him because “He [McDermott] had nothing left at that point.” McDermott did look very tired in the last two rounds of the fight, and twice turned his back on Fury and walked away from him in an effort to escape from taking punishment.
However, Fury didn’t have much power in his shots and looked almost equally tired for his own part. He probably would have won both the rounds but it’s debatable whether Fury could have knocked McDermott out.
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