By Jake Tiernan: Tyson Fury’s promoter Frank Warren says his next fight will be a “game-changer,” and it’ll be announced soon.
Fans on social media believe Fury will be fighting an MMA guy, Francis Ngaannou or Jon Jones, in a hybrid boxing match to try to make money from fans of both sports.
The fight will be viewed as a money grab for Fury to take advantage of his fans and still holding the WBC title. The World Boxing Council will need to decide whether to strip Fury of his heavyweight title if he fights a non-boxer because he can’t sit on his WBC title without defending it against real boxers.
Fury’s last title defense was against 39-year-old journeyman Dereck Chisora, who was completely shot and had lost three out of his last four fights going into the fight.
It’s fair to say that the best thing that could happen in the sport would be for Fury to lose to IBF, WBA & WBO heavyweight champion Oleksandr Usyk in December or January so this sad chapter of cherry-picking would be over.
Since Fury captured his WBC title from Deontay Wilder in 2020, using roughhouse tactics, he’s defended it three times in a trilogy with Wilder, Dillian Whyte, and Chisora. Fury was lucky not to be knocked out by Wilder when he was dropped twice in the fourth in their trilogy.
“Tyson has been training constantly for a fight. This will all settle down because it’ll be a bit of a game-changer in a couple of weeks’ time. It’ll be a massive game-changer, and it’s going to be interesting to see the fallout from it,” said Frank Warren to talkSPORT Boxing about Tyson Fury’s next fight.
Fighting an MMA guy could further erode Fury’s popularity in the UK, as he would be making a mockery of the sport, showing that he’s just looking to make money and isn’t serious about wanting to fight the best.
If Warren believes that the fans will be excited about seeing WBC heavyweight champion Fury (33-0-1, 24 KOs) fighting Ngannou or Jones, he could be kidding himself. It’s not the right time for Fury to be fighting either of those guys because he hasn’t fought anyone good in boxing for a long time.
“Is Martin Bakole & Francis Ngannou game-changers?” said Simon Jordan. “They’re bloody well not.”
“You’ll find out in a couple of weeks,” said Warren. “I guarantee that you’ll say in a couple of weeks, ‘That’s a game-changer.’ It’s a game-changer for the sport.”
