Has Opetaia Sparring Sparked Doubt in the Gypsy King for Usyk Fight??

Image: Has Opetaia Sparring Sparked Doubt in the Gypsy King for Usyk Fight??
By Daniel Mcglinchey - 01/23/2024 - Comments

Fans on social media are wondering whether the lineal heavyweight champion Tyson Fury will recover enough from being smashed by Jai Opetaia in sparring to defeat IBF/WBA/WBO champ Oleksandr Usyk on February 17th.

Will Fury be ready for Usyk after allegedly being dropped hard by the powerful former IBF cruiserweight champion?

Opetaia (24-0, 19 KOs) is rumored to have flatlined Fury (34-0-1, 24 KOs) in camp. Tyson’s training team quickly gave him the boot, sending him back home to Australia after just five rounds of sparring.

Fury’s Camp Shrouded in Secrecy

The southpaw Opetaia was used to copy Usyk’s style and was dismissed in lightning fashion after only five rounds of sparring with Fury.

While neither has admitted to the knockdown occurring, rumors have spread like wildfire on social media, indicating that someone in that camp let the cat out of the bag by revealing what happened. Fans have put two and two together to confirm that Opetaia had beaten the living daylights out of Fury.

Of course, even if they hadn’t. The fact that Opetaia left Fury’s camp after just five rounds of sparring makes it obvious to some that he’d been working over the 35-year-old Tyson and was too vicious and aggressive to stay.

Here’s the deal: If Fury hasn’t fully recovered from being beaten up by Opetaia, he may be easy work for the southpaw Usyk (22-0, 14 KOs) on February 17th in their undisputed championship fight in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia.

Impact on the Fight

Fury’s chances of success against Usyk drop considerably if he still has lingering damage from being flatlined by Opetaia in camp. If Fury still sees stars from being poleaxed by Opetaia, he will be easy pickings for Usyk.

It’s fair to say that Usyk’s trainer is working on mimicking the straight lefts that Opetaia uses because that’s the likely key to him dropping Fury like a bad habit in their sparring if that actually happened, which fans believe to be the case.

Fury’s training camp is a secretive one, making it difficult to get news on what happens during his sparring session. A couple of years ago, there were rumors of Jared Anderson beating the stuffing out of Fury in preparing him for the journeyman Dillian Whyte.

Although Jared didn’t admit it, the way he smiled while being asked about it made some boxing fans believe the rumors to be true.