By Scott Gilfoid: Four days after pulling off a big upset victory over a badly injured David Haye, Tony Bellew isn’t sure whether he’ll resume his boxing career. His trainer Dave Coldwell wants him to hang up his gloves, but he’s not certain whether he’ll do so or not. The 34-year-old Bellew says it will take a very big fight to get him out of bed to resume his career. In that respect, Bellew sounds a lot like former super middleweight champion Carl Froch before he hung up his gloves.
Bellew’s retirement talk likely means he won’t be giving Haye the rematch that he’s been asking for since he lost last Saturday night by an 11th round knockout at the O2 Arena in London, England. Haye was winning the fight until he blew out his right Achilles tendon in round 6. Bellew took advantage of Haye’s injury to defeat him. The only thing that Bellew is concerned is the fact that he won the fight. He’s less concerned with HOW he won the fight, which obviously was due to the Achilles injury.
“I can’t tell you yes I’m going to retire, I can’t tell you yes I’m going to fight again, because the true fact is – I don’t know,” said Bellew to Sky Sports News HQ. ”I do know it will take something very, very big to draw me out of that bed.”
If Bellew turns down title fights against Deontay Wilder and Joseph Parker, then he probably will be given a crack at IBF heavyweight champion Anthony Joshua if he beats Wladimir Klitschko on April 29. That’s a fight that Bellew’s promoter Eddie Hearn would have control to make. If Wladimir beats Joshua, then obviously Hearn wouldn’t be able to control what Wladimir is going to do with his titles. He doesn’t promote the Ukrainian.
Besides, Wladimir will almost surely opt for the much bigger payday in giving Joshua a rematch at Wembley Stadium. Bellew will make more money fighting Joshua than he would if he faces Wilder or Parker. Hearn and Bellew must realize this. With Bellew, he’s in a position where he only has one fight against a top heavyweight. Since Bellew is likely to lose that fight badly by a knockout, he needs to make sure that he makes that one fight count by him picking the best payday possible.
Joshua is easily the biggest payday Bellew can get if he doesn’t mind sitting around and potentially waiting for it to happen. I think it’s a forgone conclusion that Bellew will be vacating his World Boxing Council cruiserweight title rather than defending it against the winner of the Marco Huck vs. Mairis Briedis.
Bellew would have a very hard time beating either of those guys. Those are talented fighters, and they likely wouldn’t suffer a torn Achilles the way that Haye did. As such, without them suffering a terrible injury, Bellew would likely lose to both of them quite badly in my opinion. As such, I do not see Bellew keeping his WBC cruiserweight title and risking his hide against those talents.
“I’m going to take time. I know what my coach wants, my coach wants me to stop, because it’s the perfect time to do it,” said Bellew.
I don’t see Bellew retiring. I think he’s going to sit and wait as long as he has to for Joshua to get freed up for a fight. Once Joshua doesn’t have a scheduled opponent, I see Bellew facing him after he lets Hearn know to make the fight. Joshua is the same promotional stable as Bellew, so making the fight is very easy, as long as he’s on board with waiting for a while.