Former cruiserweight champ and boxing expert Steve “USS” Cunningham knows all about the rough stuff Tyson Fury is capable of using in a fight. It was way back in 2013 when an emerging Fury took on Cunningham in what was his first big test. And Fury, a far less experienced fighter than he is today of course, suffered a knockdown as a result of smaller man Cunningham’s precise punching, while Fury was rocked on other occasions in the exciting tussle.
Fury roughed Cunningham up, he hit and held, he leaned on the lighter, shorter man, and Fury eventually got the KO win. Now, when asked his opinion on what happens when Fury finally fights Oleksandr Usyk (the new date being May 18 as all fans know, although far from all fans are certain the fight will actually happen then, or at all), Cunningham says he thinks Fury will “get disqualified.”
“If I had to put my money on it I think Tyson Fury will be disqualified,” Cunningham said when speaking with IFL TV. “That’s my prediction, he’s going to have to lean on Usyk. He will not be able to go skill for kill. After my fight, Fury upped his game. He is not the same fighter who fought Steve Cunningham. He upgraded himself, definitely. Usyk is better than me, more accomplished, more comfortable, and he’s a southpaw so I think Fury’s going to have to use those tactics to win and he’s going to have to get heavy and lean on him when Usyk starts dialling in that matrix and picking him apart so he’s going to have to slow him down somehow. I predict Usyk points [win] or Fury disqualification [loss].”
Cunningham is not the first person to suggest that Fury will try the rough stuff such as leaning and mauling when he fights Usyk, the fastest, most nimble, most difficult to nail target Fury will ever have encountered. And it is possible, with a strong referee who will not be intimidated, that Fury could indeed be slung out for being dirty. We all hope this does not prove to be the case, as after all this time waiting, the last thing we want is a fight that ends in an unsatisfactory manner.
But is Cunningham right when he says Fury will not be able to match Usyk “skill for skill?” And if Cunningham is right, how will Fury react on the night, if his boxing isn’t working and if he is unable to crack Usyk with a big punch, if he is indeed being “picked apart?” If frustration kicks in, might Fury try and take it to the streets, so to speak, and could that DQ come as a result?
Maybe, and in Fury’s mind (and in the minds of his supporters) a DQ loss would not rank as a “real” defeat. I can hear a disqualified Fury now, bellowing how Usyk was a “p***y,” a “coward who couldn’t take the heat when things got tough!”
But again, let’s hope it doesn’t come to that. We want to see who wins the fight, fairly and within the rules of the noble art.