By Jim Calfa: Looking badly beat up with a blackened left eye, Tyson Fury today was in damage control mode a day after his controversial ten round split decision, attempting to whitewash his third round knockdown at the hands of Ngannou, saying that he was hit with a rabbit punch to the back of the head.
Replays showed it was a legal punch, and not to the back of the head like the ones Fury hurt Deontay Wilder with in their second fight.
Fury didn’t mention the elbow that he hit Ngannou with during the fight, which fans felt was an example of dirty fighting on his part.
Interestingly, Fury (34-0-1, 24 KOs) was dismissive of Ngannou’s offense, stating that he wasn’t hit with much other than the phantom rabbit punch in the third round last Saturday night at Kingdom Arena in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia.
Ngannou rematch not happening
Fury says he’s now planning on moving on to face IBF/WBA/WBO heavyweight champion Oleksandr Usyk next in “the biggest fight of our generation”, and he says he’s going to leave it up to his promoters to decide the date for the clash.
“He punches hard, but it was a bit like a hook on the back of the head, the knockdown, but apart from that, he didn’t really get me with much else,” said Tyson Fury to Boxing King Media, sounding like he’s trying to whitewash what happened to him in his fight with Francis Ngannou.
It would have been better if Fury just admitted that he’d been knocked down from a clean punch in the third and that he was hurt on another occasion in the eighth when his eyes rolled around to the back of his head after getting nailed by a left hook from Ngannou.
“I felt like my timing was off; I’d been out of the ring for nearly a year again,’ said Fury.”It was a bit of ring rust. It was far from one of my best performances. It wasn’t a vintage Tyson Fury, but you do what you got to do in there and get through and onto the next one.
“You can’t be the best version of yourself every time. So it’s about keep going and onto the next one, which is Oleksandr Usyk for the undisputed championship,” said Fury.
So there it is. Fury plans on fighting Usyk next at a still-to-be-determined date, and there will not be a rematch for Ngannou.
Fury vs. Usyk next
If the promoters kick the fight into next year in February or March, the boxing public will likely have forgotten all about what took place with the Ngannou fight and will be excited at seeking Fury & Usyk, believing these are the two best in the division, which would be furthest from the truth.
It would be a battle between two aging champions, neither of which is the best or second-best in the division. Just two old guys that hold belts, but neither anywhere close to the best.
It’s a fight involving two champions who appeared to lose their last fights. Many boxing fans believe Usyk deserved a knockout loss in his last title defense against Daniel Dubois last August. Usyk was dropped by what appeared to be a legal body shot in the fifth and was down for four minutes.
During all this time, he wasn’t clutching his groin like fighters do when they were hit low. He was grabbing his midsection as if the air had been knocked out of him by the hard punch from Dubois that he was unprepared for.
“Nothing major, no serious injuries,” said Fury. “I don’t know. I’m just going to leave it to the guys that are promoting it,” said Tyson when asked when he’ll be facing Usyk. “I’m going to go back now, take a rest, and get back in the gym.
“Listen, get yourself prepared, and we’ll put on the biggest fight of our generation, of the century, for the undisputed championship of the world,” said Fury when asked about a message that he has for Usyk. “We roll into the next one.”
