Tyson Fury knows he was in the fight of his life against Francis Ngannou.
The reigning WBC heavyweight champion—and lineal heavyweight titleholder, having never lost his belts in competition—earned a split nod over Ngannou this past Saturday in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, getting the better of a 10-round contest that saw him badly hurt in Round 3. Coming out of the fight, many of Ngannou’s peers praised him for his performance and criticized the scoring.
For Fury’s part, he’s giving full credit to Ngannou for the stiff challenge he provided in what was the former UFC heavyweight champion’s boxing debut
Did you underestimate him?
“Nope,” Fury told Boxing King Media when asked if he underestimated Ngannou. “You can’t take anything away from Francis Ngannou. He’s a good fighter and he gave me a very good fight and that was it. I trained very well. I prepared very good. I don’t think I have an excuse or anything.
“It’s boxing. Some days you have good days, some days you don’t. You crack on and you continue, keep moving forward.”
From the moment their bout was announced, Fury was designated as the massive favorite over Ngannou. Fury is 33-0-1 heading into Saturday’s crossover contest and his past three outings were dominant performances against Derek Chisora, Dillian Whyte, and Deontay Wilder.
Fury obviously felt Ngannou’s power in Round 3, but there wasn’t any one moment that made Fury realize how much of a threat Ngannou was. In the lead-up to the fight, he frequently spoke about taking the boxing neophyte as seriously as possible.
“Listen, usually when you get the media saying it’s a mismatch, it’s not worth watching and all that, usually you’re in for a tough night,” Fury said. “If I wasn’t training as hard as I did, I probably wouldn’t have gotten through that fight.”
However, Fury added that he wasn’t overwhelmed by the strength of Ngannou’s punches and maintained that the knockdown was caused by a left hook catching him in an awkward spot.
“He punches hard but it was a bit like a hook on the back of the head, the knockdown in round whatever it was, 3, but apart from that he didn’t get very much else,” Fury said.
One notable voice that has been heavily critical of Fury is Matchroom Boxing promoter Eddie Hearn. He told DAZN that he thought Fury’s performance was so poor, that it “looked like he never boxed before.”
It’s unclear if Fury is aware of that specific quote because when asked about Hearn, Fury said he didn’t want to hear what the promoter had to say.
“Eddie Hearn’s a sausage,” Fury said. “I don’t care what he says. It would be nothing good anyway. Forget about it, don’t even read it to me. Not interested.”
The fight with Ngannou marked Fury’s first since beating Chisora last December, marking a near-11-month stretch of inactivity for the heavyweight king. He acknowledged that his timing was off, but refused to make excuses for the fight being so unexpectedly close.
Up next, he’s expected to face Oleksandr Usyk in a bout that would unify all the major heavyweight titles. The two sides are currently in disagreement over when the fight will take place, with a previously announced Dec. 23 date not guaranteed.
“Listen, I don’t know about a bad night because that’s taking away from Francis Ngannou’s performance,” Fury said. “He did very well. That’s it, really. It’s boxing.
“You can’t be the best version of yourself every time but it’s about keep going and on to the next one, which is Oleksandr Usyk for the undisputed championship.”
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