By Jake Tiernan: Carl Froch says Francis Nganou deserved the win by two or three rounds last Saturday night against lineal heavyweight champion Tyson Fury and the only reason that he didn’t get the victory with the judges was because the Fury-Oleksandr Usyk undisputed fight had already been signed for December 23rd.
Obviously, the Saudis can’t be happy about the outcome, as it taints their event last night that they spent loads of cash on. The undercard was just plain awful, filled with mismatches, and the outcome of the main event was the cherry on the cake of a nightmarish evening.
For $79.99, fans at home got nothing for the money they spent ordering the Fury-Ngannou fight on PPV.
The way Fury fled the ring immediately after the fight made him look like he was taking the money & running to avoid the coming storm of criticism. After this performance, it’s difficult to imagine the Saudis would ever want Fury back in their country.
In an outcome that raised many eyebrows, Fury was given a ten round split decision over Ngannou last Saturday night at Kingdom Arena in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia.
The judges’ scores:
95-94 – Fury
96-93 – Fury
95-94 – Ngannou
Froch feels it’s an example of flat-out corruption in boxing, with Fury (34-0-1, 24 KOs) getting another controversial win to protect his record and keep him moving forward with his career.
Carl states that Fury needs to do the right thing by giving Ngannou (0-1) a rematch because the former UFC heavyweight champion deserves one after the disputed results of last night’s fight.
Some boxing fans believe Fury deserved two defeats in his fights with Deontay Wilder in their first and third contests and disqualification in their second when he incapacitated him with fouls.
Fury deserved to lose
“Tyson Fury got beat. That was a bad decision,” said Carl Froch on his Youtube site, talking about Fury’s robbery win over Francis Ngannou in their ‘Battle of the Baddest’ event last Saturday night.
The fans think Fury got beat, but the two judges who gave him the win are all that matters. In the record books, Fury has a ten round split decision win over Ngannou, and he’s obviously going to move on rather than revisit the fight.
Yeah, Fury mouthed some words about giving Ngannou a rematch after the fight, but that’s unlikely to happen unless the Saudis give him another big wad of cash, which is highly unlikely after the backlash that has erupted over last night’s outcome.
“I’m not going to say it was a blatant robbery. A lot of the rounds were close, but for me, Francis Ngannou won that fight,” said Froch. “I think the reason the fight was in Tyson Fury’s favor last night was purely because this fight [against Oleksandr Usyk] was talked about on 23rd on December.”
There have been worse robberies than this, but this was still a very bad one. What’s interesting is that controversial decisions tend to mostly happen in favor of the A-side fighter, which is why boxing fans label them robberies.
The money fighter tends to get the benefit of the doubt, and that’s what Froch seems to be noticing here.
“Tyson Fury vs. Oleksandr Usyk undisputed, that’s the fight we should be getting, and that’s the reason I think Ngannou didn’t get the nod last night. For me, it’s corruption at the highest level.
“They’ve gone out to Saudi Arabia, all that money is on the line, everything is geared towards the fight with Fury & Usyk, and Ngannou gets in there and puts a proper spanner in the works. He gave Tyson Fury a bit of a beating, dropped him, made him look stupid, and he’s [Ngannou] a novice professional,” said Froch.
Tyson looked beat up
“When Tyson Fury got out of the ring, his left eye was closing; he got a small cut above his head,” Froch said. “He looked like he got beat up. I know that doesn’t always tell the story of the fight, but Ngannou looked like he was unmarked. What a gentleman Ngannou was. He was so magnanimous in defeat.”
Fury looked like he’d been in a car crash after the fight and didn’t look well from having taken so many hard shots from Ngannou.
“He thought he won. He didn’t b***ch about it. He did himself, his country, and his family proud because he thought he deserved to win. He didn’t moan about it,” said Froch.
“What does Tyson Fury do now? Is he going to fight Usyk now on the 23rd of December? I don’t see how he’s going to go now on the back of that loss; I know he got the decision, but to me, it was a loss, and on the back of that loss, go in with Usyk on the 23rd of December.
“He’s talking about, ‘I’m not bothered about my legacy. I just want to earn money,’ and he’s got plenty of that now. It’s a good job that he’s not bothered about his legacy because, you know what?
“At the minute, his legacy is in tatters because his best was against Klitschko and against Deontay Wilder, two wins and the other fight with Deontay Wilder was a draw, and who else is a standout victory on his record?
“A couple of gatekeepers [Dillian Whyte & Dereck Chisora], and now he’s gone in there and been beaten up by Ngannou. The fans are already turning on him, and now they’re going to say, ‘Hang on a minute, Ngannou was robbed.'”
Fans had Ngannou winning
“99.9% of the people’s feedback on social media and on the networks are all saying that Ngannou was robbed,” said Froch. “They’re going to be even more p***d off with Fury.
What makes it worse for Fury is his silence. He should have already spoken to the media to assure them that he would be giving Ngannou a rematch next and that would be returning to the ring in November to fight him again.
If Fury feels that Usyk is a piece of cake, he shouldn’t have any issue about fighting Ngannou next month, followed by Oleksandr in December.
“That’s a great fight. I think Francis Ngannou deserves a rematch with Ngannou based on that performance,” said Froch. “Over 99%, which means that everyone is saying that Ngannou won the fight. So there lies the justification for an immediate rematch, but you’ve got the complications with Usyk, sitting there waiting for his December 23rd shot.
“I don’t think Tyson Fury is going to fight Usyk on the 23rd of December. I think he’s going to want some more time. I’m hearing that he’s saying that he’s going to think about what he’s doing now, a small press conference. I’m not seeing comments from Tyson Fury in the follow-up to that fight.
“They don’t want to talk about it, they don’t want to be put under criticism, they don’t want to answer the questions. It’s turned into a bit of a fiasco this whole professional boxing at the top level, especially at heavyweight. It’s all going a bit mad,” said Froch.
Gypsy King’s legacy in tatters
“Tyson Fury, that performance against Ngannou last night did him no favors in terms of his fan base, terms of the people that are backing him and want him to do well,” Carl said. “People are now turning on him, and he’s saying that he’s not bothered about legacy; he’s just bothered about money. Well, it’s a good thing he’s not bothered about legacy because, as I said earlier, his legacy is in tatters.”
Boxing fans have been turning on Fury for some time, dating back to his ‘long count’ win over Deontay Wilder in 2021 and his first fight with the Bronze Bomber when the referee gave him a count when he was knocked cold in the twelfth round.
In Fury’s last two fights, he didn’t help his popularity by choosing Derek Chisora & Dillian Whyte. Chisora had lost three out of his last four fights going into that fight, yet Fury chose him to defend his WBC title against rather than one of the deserving contenders.
“He can’t retire after that fight there; he can’t turn it is, but he just might do,” said Froch. ‘“I’ve got 150 million,’ whatever he’s bragging about in the bank. ‘I don’t need any more money. I don’t need this, I’m going to turn it in,’ but for his legacy, he needs to fight Usyk.”
Fury obviously isn’t going to retire until he at least has picked up the dough on the table for a match against Usyk. If Tyson wins that, he’ll stick around long enough for the cash-out payday against Anthony Joshua.
You have to figure that’s a fight that Fury can get a minimum of $50 million and closer to $80M, especially if he’s not worn out his welcome with the Saudis.
“I can’t see that happening on the 23rd of December. I think it goes into next year, but before then, I think Francis Ngannou deserves a rematch because he won that fight,” said Froch.
