Fury Blames Usyk For Fight Collapse
Plans to stage Tyson Fury vs Oleksandr Usyk for all four of the major heavyweight titles next month have imploded; Fury has declared that to be Usyk’s fault; plus Otto Wallin offers to step in to fight Fury while Martin Bakole now hopes to position himself to challenge Usyk
Oleksandr Usyk’s promoter Alex Krassyuk insists the reason talks have broken down between with Tyson Fury is down to Fury’s demands over a rematch clause
Tyson Fury has blamed Oleksandr Usyk for their undisputed heavyweight championship fight falling through.
Fury, the WBC titlist, had looked on course to box unified WBO, WBA and IBF champion Usyk on April 29.
But, despite a long period of negotiation, the two teams could not reach a conclusion and talks finally collapsed on Wednesday.
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Fury accused Usyk of running, saying, “You were never man enough to tangle with the ‘Gypsy King’, ever in your life.”
Usyk had accepted Fury’s public challenge of taking the short end of a 70/30 purse split on the proviso that Fury made a sizeable donation to the Ukrainian relief effort.
In a foul-mouthed tirade on social media on Thursday, Fury declared that Usyk “tried all week to get out of it, begging for a rematch”.
“You got your rematch, then didn’t even want to fight at that,” he continued. “You little 14st coward.”
Usyk’s promoter Alex Krassyuk revealed that the discussion over the rematch clause and purse split for a potential second fight was the final straw for the unified champion.
Krassyuk said that the rematch clause was just the point where it all exploded.
Usyk had verbally agreed to a 70/30 split with Fury if his opponent donated £1m to Ukraine
“The discussion about the rematch split was just the point where Usyk was fed up with everything. He said, “How many more times do I have to bow my head in front of Tyson. Why should I do this? It’s enough. Either he accepts what I say or I leave. Tyson did not accept it and he left.”
Krassyuk did say a one-fight deal could still be acceptable although then “the split should not be 70/30″.
The fight, it appears, cannot be saved and in the coming days the WBA is expected to instruct Usyk to box its mandatory challenger Daniel Dubois.
“Keep running. Fight Dubois at the Copperbox now. And always know you or anybody else like you could never tangle with the ‘Gypsy King’.” Fury said.
Sky Sports/Samuel Isaiah
