“When I look in the mirror I don’t see a quitter,” Tyson Fury says as, having suffered the first defeat of his professional career in a dramatic world heavyweight title fight against Oleksandr Usyk in May, he is about to step back into the fire of their rematch this Saturday night in Riyadh. “I see a man who would do anything to keep going. If I get knocked down nine times, I’ll get up 10. If I didn’t want to do that, I wouldn’t be a boxer, I’d be doing something else, like playing darts. But this is my job.”
Fury and Usyk dug into the reserves of their resilience and the Ukrainian won a split decision. Usyk was losing the bout narrowly when, in a remarkable ninth round, he hurt Fury and looked close to stopping his much bigger opponent. But Fury is a fighter to the core and being rocked repeatedly would never deter him from stepping back into the ring.
Of course there is one key motivation, for these prize-fighters, in facing each other twice in seven months. “Before even the first fight, we had a rematch clause for a hell of a lot of money,” Fury says bluntly. “I’d have to have no legs, no arms and half my head chopped off not to take the rematch. No eyeballs as well. I’d do it if I was blind.”
Such gory jesting is typical of Fury but, in a couple of recent conversations with the deposed champion, he is more intent on stressing a matter-of-fact acceptance of his loss and a seriousness of purpose sometimes missing from their first bout. Seemingly in control of the fight, Fury often chose to fool around.
“I need to be more focused this time and not do as much showboating,” he concedes. “One of the commentators said: ‘Has anybody ever seen Tyson Fury clown this much against even lower level opposition?’ That’s how easy it was for me and you can get complacent.”
Apart from cutting back on the showboating, Fury insists that, “I won’t change anything. Why would I when I had control of the fight for maybe 80% of it? I’m landing on him at will, head and body, lead right uppercuts, left hooks, right hooks to the body, doubles at times. I don’t need to change anything. I don’t think he can, either, because he ain’t going to outbox me on the back foot. He has to come forward and make a fight of it.”
Fury has watched their classic first battle “a hundred times”, starting with an immediate viewing on the flight home from Riyadh. “You can say ‘I woulda, shoulda, coulda’ but you can’t reverse it. It was my best performance in the last five years, probably more. Before [the ninth round] I boxed unbelievable. I thought Usyk did good as well. That’s the best I’ve ever seen Usyk box.”
He had tried to ridicule Usyk relentlessly in the protracted buildup to their bout in May, but Fury is much more respectful now. He admits that “I didn’t feel as if I could have knocked him out at any point. I hurt him a few times to the body and with head shots but I didn’t feel I was going to take him out.”
He also argues that defeat to Usyk caused little regret: “I was over the result on the flight home. Listen, I’m not affected by it. If I’d have got the decision over Usyk, hooray! But I would have still went back to Morecambe and picked up dog shit. It’s not like I’m going to movie premieres in LA and hanging out with celebrities. That ain’t me. I’m still in the Bay area of Lancashire. I got back on a Monday and straightaway I was at the tip because the bins were overflowing. Life goes on and you go back to normal, essential jobs.”
On Saturday night Fury will return to his dangerous and solitary main line of work as he tries to regain the three world heavyweight titles which will be on offer. Usyk is the most skilful and smartest fighter he has ever faced but Fury takes comfort from his certainty that the former undisputed world cruiserweight champion lacks the chilling force of Deontay Wilder. The American couldn’t beat him in three fights but he knocked down Fury on four occasions.
“I’ll speak brutally because I’ve fought both men,” Fury says of Wilder and Usyk. “Both are good fighters but when you’re in the ring with a prime Deontay Wilder, with his 42 KOs, you’re in trouble whether it’s round one or round 12 with two seconds to go. One mistake, it’s game over. With Usyk, I don’t feel that much terror. There’s no fear.
“After he hit me in round nine, he caught me with a few free shots and didn’t knock me down. If I’d have had him in that position, I’d have knocked him out. If I’d have been in that position with Daniel Dubois, I’d have been knocked out cold. So he’s a good boxer, and can punch hard, but one man can switch you off like a TV, and one man can hit you and hurt you and try to wear you down.”
Fury maintains that the first fight “was close, but I thought I did enough to win it. I’ve met people who’ve said: ‘I thought you lost it by a round. Other people have said: ‘I thought it was a draw.’ I’ve met people who said, ‘I thought you nicked it by a couple.’
But it’s no good crying about it, saying, ‘I’m going to sack the cook! It was his problem! The nutritionist! The conditioner!’ No one’s fault, but my own for getting caught.”
He pauses, shrugs and then adds another salient truth: “I didn’t get the W on the night but it was a fantastic fight. That’s why we’re doing a rematch.”
