Tyson Fury dismisses former heavyweight champion Anthony Joshua as yesterday’s news following his loss to Oleksandr Usyk last September. The recent loss for Joshua, his second in the last three years, has done a number on his once-promising career.
After being thoroughly humiliated by the much smaller former undisputed cruiserweight champion Usyk (19-0, 13 KOs) last September in London, Joshua will be fighting to save his career when he faces the Ukrainian in his ill-conceived rematch.
Fury doesn’t take the twice-beaten former IBF/WBA/WBO champion Joshua (24-2, 22 KOs) seriously anymore, but he’ll still face him just for kicks to give him a good battering.
Unfortunately, it’s not looking like we’ll ever see a fight between WBC heavyweight champion Fury (31-0-1,22 KOs) and Joshua.
With Joshua, 32, stubbornly insisting on forcing a rematch with Usyk, he’s probably going to lose that fight and then hang up his gloves.
Fury is still willing to fight Joshua
“I’m not sure what to think about Anthony Joshua anymore. Quite frankly, nobody cares about him anymore, But I’ll knock him out just for bants,” said Fury to DubaiEyeSport on a future clash against Joshua.
Unfortunately, it’s doubtful that Fury will get the chance to fight Joshua. AJ had an opportunity to guarantee himself a lucrative fight against Fury if he’d agreed to the step aside offer that was given to him.
Instead of taking the money, Joshua opted for the less promising alternative in facing Usyk again in an immediate rematch. Now, all that dough that Joshua would have made in a fight againstFury is likely gone forever.
Yeah, Joshua can STILL take the fight with Fury coming off two consecutive defeats against Usyk, but will he? I don’t think so. Joshua has too much pride, and he won’t want to look pathetic by fighting Fury, mainly if he’s coming off a bad knockout loss to Usyk.
If anything, Joshua will sake his whole training team and ask Usyk for a third fight, saying, ‘Things will be different with another coach.’ To be sure, it’ll look utterly ridiculous at that point for Joshua to be insisting on a third bite out of the apple against Usyk, which is why he would be better off retiring.
Tyson is not impressed with Usyk
“Hell no. What’s [Usyk] going to do? Tap dance around the ring and run away? He didn’t do any damage at all to Anthony Joshua and definitely ain’t doing damage to me. I’ll obliterate him,” said Fury when asked if Usyk would be as challenging a fight for him as Deontay Wilder.
“He’s a cruiserweight; he’s a pumped-up middleweight,” Fury continued about Usyk. “He was a middleweight in the amateurs, 75 kilos. I was a super heavyweight at 11-year-old,” said Fury.
Unless something unforeseen happens against Dillian Whyte, there’s an excellent chance Fury, and Usyk will be squaring off later this year for the undisputed championship.
Whyte (28-2, 19 KOs) has shown nothing in his last handful of fights for him to be viewed as a threat to Fury. Dillian lost to 40-year-old Alexander Povetkin in 2020 and took a pounding in his fight against 39-year-old Mariusz Wach in 2019.
In Whyte’s fights with Dereck Chisora and Joseph Parker, he struggled against them and was lucky to get the victories. It’s too bad that the World Boxing Council made it so easy for Whyte to become mandatory for Fury by having him face Oscar Rivas.
If they had ordered Whyte to face Filip Hrgovic, Frank Sanchez, or Tony Yoka, we’d have a far more exciting fight ahead for Fury in April.
“Whatever I feel like on the night, really. I don’t pay these bums too much attention,” said Fury about his title defense against Whyte.
“Any style, I can definitely beat Whyte. Even if I put one hand behind my back and one foot off the floor, I’ll still beat him.”
“For me, I’m fairly stuck in boxing for another couple of fights, and then we’ll see what happens from there,” said Fury.
