Top Rank boss Bob Arum has admitted his company is partly to blame for the postponement of the WBC heavyweight title defence of Tyson Fury 30-0-1 (21) against Deontay Wilder 42-1-1 (41) after the champion tested positive to Covid-19.
The bout was originally scheduled to take place at the T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas, Nevada on July 24 but was pushed back to October 9 after Fury’s positive test.
“I’m not a psychiatrist but I spent considerable time with Fury after the arbitrator’s decision then after his diagnosis,” Arum told Sky Sports.
“It seemed to me he wasn’t affected by anything. Tyson had a great mentality and none of these issues have any affect. Is he fooling me? Fooling himself? I don’t think so. None of this has affected him adversely.
“It was negligence on all of ours parts – Top Rank’s and Tyson’s. It started out with a nice, relatively small group, of sparring partners in our gym.
“Before anybody realized the sparring partners were bringing in friends and [Fury’s trainer] Sugarhill Steward had other fighters that he was training. Nobody was testing. It was going on the way we used to do it, before Covid. That was irresponsible on all of our parts.
“Tyson had a relatively mild case but had heavy breathing and congestion. There was no choice but to postpone it. We are hoping the bans on travel will be lifted and we will get some Brits over for the fight. They bring such a vibe to an arena!”
Meanwhile Fury’s co-trainer Andy Lee said he is chalking up the champion’s subpar performances in camp for the original fight date on the virus.
“He was good, but we all had COVID, so he wasn’t too good,” Lee said to iFL TV. “He might have had it before, I suspect. I can’t point fingers at one of the sparring partners, but he felt a bit run down before he got tested.
“Once he got tested, he was the first person to test clear on an antigen test. He was the first person, so he probably had it previous before we got it.
“We weren’t tested clear for a few days, so he was tested quite early testing clear. It seems like he made a good full recovery. I feel great now, even after having it.
“I had four or five days of being really tired and run down, and he was the same. That’s it. It was a shame that we were sickened by it really because it’s been a long time, and he just wants to fight.”
Fury was held to a draw by Wilder in their first contest in Los Angeles in December 2018. In their rematch in Las Vegas in February last year, Fury dominated Wilder en route to a seventh-round knockout.
Lee is expecting an even quicker finish in their trilogy fight.
“I think he’ll do it earlier than he did the first time, but I still think it’ll be an extremely dangerous fight because Wilder will be fresh and highly motivated,” Lee said.
“[Wilder] will probably be motivated by having a new trainer [in Malik Scott], learning new things. He’ll probably be enthusiastic now, but I still don’t know how he’s going to recover mentally from that fight.
“It’s going to take a huge effort mentally to come back from that defeat and the manner of that defeat the first time.
“Tyson is such a good fighter and his mentality is unbelievable. Tyson is just a child, in a way.
“If I said, ‘I’m going to run up that mountain,’ he would say, ‘Well, you’re not going to beat me.’ I pushed him to the point of vomiting, but he keeps going.
“His mentality is unreal. For anyone to be around him, it’s such a benefit, yeah.”
