Tyson Fury's promoter Bob Arum is still eager to make a major crossover fight between his man and UFC heavyweight champion Francis Ngannou.
Fury and Ngannou are considered the best heavyweights in their respective sports, and having both got broadcast deals with ESPN in America and BT Sport in the UK, there's real potential for a super-fight. The only stumbling block is Ngannou's current knee injury, coupled with the fact that he is currently shackled to an exclusive contract with the MMA promotion.
But he will be able to leave his contract as the champion in January if a new deal isn't made, which looks increasingly likely as every day passes. UFC boss Dana White almost never allows his fighters to work with other promotions, barring a few notable exceptions like Conor McGregor's massive money fight with Floyd Mayweather.
And Arum, with whom White has a famously bad relationship, wants to entice Fury back to the ring with a mega-fight against Ngannou. The UFC star is one of the biggest names Fury could face, and the fight would make both men millions.
“Ngannou is still recovering from an injury, but I would love to do that fight,” Arum told Fight Hub TV this week. “Depending on Ngannou’s contract with the UFC, we need to do it with or without the UFC. But that would be a huge, huge event.
“I’m interested. Who wouldn’t be? Ngannou is the heavyweight champion of the UFC and with Tyson Fury, I think it will be a huge, huge event.”
In MMA circles, whoever the UFC champion is will for all intents and purposes be considered the best fighter on the planet in a given weight class. In boxing, it is complicated by there being four major governing bodies in the WBA, WBO, IBF and WBC.
Fury holds the WBC belt, having just defeated his mandatory challenger Dillian Whyte in April before calling out Ngannou. But to become undisputed, he would need to defeat the winner of Oleksandr Usyk vs Anthony Joshua 2 which happens this summer, as Usyk holds the other belts, with Daniel Dubois also having claim to the less-important WBA "regular" title.
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But he has very little interest in fighting competitively again, insisting that he would rather keep his future ring returns to exhibition bouts. He still has ambitions of fighting Ngannou, however, and even listed his head-to-head with the Cameroonian fighter one of his highlights of the night at Wembley.
"It couldn't have gone any better, we had a record-breaking crowd for any event and we had a brilliant knock out to cap it all off," Fury told Queensberry Promotions when questioned about the highlights from his victory over Whyte.
"What a send off; the fireworks, the crowd, the fans, the sing-song and the UFC guy jumping it at the end and me asking how big his Corey was. It doesn't get any bigger than that. It was definitely a dream come true, for me to be boxing at home at Wembley against a British opponent defending my titles on an epic night in April it was an absolutely fantastic night."
