By Scott Gilfoid: Former heavyweight champion Tyson Fury says he’ll fight IBF/WBA heavyweight champion Anthony Joshua in a winner takes all fight if he’s interested. This would be Fury’s first fight of his comeback to boxing after 2 years out of the ring.
The message behind Fury offering to face Joshua in a winner takes all bout is he wants him to know that he’s not trying to get a cash out fight against him. Fury is interested in facing Joshua (20-0, 20 KO, because he believes he’s the better fighter, and he wants the chance to prove it.
Unfortunately, Joshua will likely never agree to a winner takes all, and it’s unlikely that Fury would ever give his purse to Joshua if he were to lose. Fighters often use the old ‘winner takes all’ challenge to attract attention to themselves in the boxing world. It’s just another way to name drop to get the fans to pay attention to them. Fury will likely come up with some other attention-seeking trick in the next few days to get the boxing fans to pay attention to him.
“Anthony Joshua To prove this fight is not about a few measly pounds for me I’ll do a winner take all! Loser gets nothing but a beating & that loser will be you,” Fury said.
Fury isn’t going to get a fight with Joshua in his first fight back from his 2-year layoff, and he’s not going to get him to agree to the purse bet. Fury needs to forget about those 2 things, and instead focus on losing the rest of the weight that he needs to take off to get prepared for his first fight back in early 2018.
Fury isn’t going to be able to convince Joshua and the boxing world that he’s not looking for a big payday. The fans already see Fury as just looking for money, which is why he’s so focused on fighting Joshua instead of someone like WBC heavyweight champion Deontay ‘Bronze Bomber’ Wilder or WBO champion Joseph Parker.
If it was just about the sport, then Fury would be looking to fight one of them instead of him yapping 24/7 about wanting to fight Joshua all the time. If it were me, I’d ignore Joshua entirely and look to let the fight marinate properly. Fury doesn’t need to fight Joshua yet. The Joshua-Fury fight needs to build slowly. Joshua’s promoter Eddie Hearn has the right idea by wanting Fury to take the weight off, and get a few fights under his belt before facing Joshua.
“Don’t be fooled by this fraud Anthony Joshua trying to con the boxing fans,” said Fury. ”He struggled with a 41yo man in Wladimir after I schooled him! Then made hard work of Takam who took fight on 11 days’ notice. I’m the real Don of the heavyweights, if only he had the heart to fight me.”
Fury needs to get his boxing license back this month, and then take at least one tune-up fight before he can have a realistic chance of fighting Joshua or Parker. Hearn would likely be against Fury taking on Parker or Wilder before the Joshua fight, but it’s up to him what he wants to do.
Fury would do well against someone like Alexander Povetkin in 2018. If Fury could win a couple of quick tune-up fights and then take on Povetkin, it would give him a chance to build the Joshua fight. Fury would have a huge size advantage over the 6’2” Povetkin, who hasn’t looked good in his last 2 fights against Christian Hammer and Andrey Rudenko. The Fury that beat Wladimir Klitschko in 2015 would have an easy time defeating Povetkin. That was a long time ago. Fury might not ever be able to get back to the fighter he was back then.