With just over 20 days to go, there are complaints from the boxing community that WBC heavyweight champion Fury may retire from the tournament on May 18 in Saudi Arabia, where there are just over 20 days to go.
According to Usyk's promoter, Alexander, they are unsure whether Fury will be able to participate in the unification battle on 18 May, because Fury has retired three times since April last year, and if he chooses to retire again before the race on 18 May, it will be the fourth time that Usyk has been released by Fury.
Alexander said: "Usyk has changed three training camps, he had the first training camp since September last year, when the match was scheduled for December, and as a result, Fury and Naganno played badly, after the match, Fury asked for a postponement of the match with Usyk, we agreed, and at the beginning of February this year, Fury said that his eyebrow arch was opened by a sparring partner, and asked for an extension, I saw the photos and was convinced that the wound was real, but I suspect that the wound was not beaten by the sparring partner." Then, the united front was postponed until May, and we agreed. In fact, we were released 4 times, and the unification match between Usyk and Fury was originally scheduled for April last year, but in the end Usyk chose Dubois because Fury was backsliding. ”
In order to prevent Fury from releasing the pigeons for the fourth time, Alexander and Usyk's coach Laping came up with a punishment mechanism, that is, whoever withdraws from the race will have to pay 10 million US dollars, about 73 million yuan, Alexander: "If Fury retires again, he will take the compensation, but even if there is compensation, I am still not sure that he will participate because he is afraid of losing to Usyk." ”
If Fury retires, the organizers have also thought of a substitute, namely IBF legal challenger Hrgovic, who was supposed to fight former WBA ordinary boxing champion Dubois on June 1, but if Fury does retire, he will not hesitate to fight Usyk, after all, Usyk has three belts in his hands.
From today's heavyweight pattern, it can be felt that mainland heavyweight boxing champion Zhang Zhilei has twice missed the opportunity to hit the heavyweight triple crown, one is when he lost to Hrgovic on points in August 2022 and missed the IBF mandatory challenger, and the other is when he lost to Parker on points last month and lost his WBO mandatory challenger status.
Although Zhang Zhilei will face former WBC champion Wilder on June 1, Wild no longer has any title and does not have the status of a legal challenger, so even if Zhang Zhilei beats Wilder, he will not be able to exchange for the belt or the status of a forced challenger, and he still has to look for other opponents in the future. It can only be said that Zhang Zhilei is lucky and unlucky, fortunately Joyce gave him the opportunity to fight last year and let him get the WBO transitional title, unlucky is that he lost the opportunity to challenge Fury and Usyk twice to make a lot of money, as for when he will regain the position of mandatory challenger, no one can say.