WBC heavyweight champion Tyson Fury 30-0-1 (21) says he is prepared to cheat again to defeat former titleholder Deontay Wilder 42-1-1 (41) in their trilogy fight at the T-Mobile Arenia in Las Vegas, Nevada on Saturday night.
The 33-year-old Brit outboxed Wilder for the majority of rounds in their first fight in Los Angeles in December 2018 but a pair of knockdowns late in the fight – including in a dramatic final found – allowed the American to hold on to the WBC by split draw.
The rematch in February last year was a very different story. Fury went from matador to bull, walking down Wilder and dropping him twice en route to a seventh-round stoppage when the towel came in to stop the 35-year-old suffering any further punishment.
In the wake of the loss Wilder came up with myriad excuses as to why he lost. Amongst them were claim that his water was spiked, his ringwalk costume was too heavy and affected his legs, and that Fury boxed with loaded gloves.
Noe of the claims have been substantiated, but Fury says he understands why Wilder made them.
“We’ve boxed 19 rounds and he’s practically won two rounds out of 19,” Fury told The MMA Hour. “With Wilder, in my opinion, he’s come out with all this stuff saying I’ve cheated. Whether he believes it or not is another thing, but he has to try and sell the fight somehow.
“He has to try and make a reason why he could win. So he clearly couldn’t do the reasons why in a boxing fight so he has to make other reasons for his own self, for the people around him who are saying he can do this, he can do that.
“If he went into this fight saying, ‘You know what? I got absolutely annihilated the second time, it’s probably going to happen to me again’ then his mental attitude would definitely be of a loss straight away.
“But if he’s convinced himself that there’s been some skullduggery going on, maybe he thinks in his own mind he has got a better chance or something.
“You know what? I’m going to cheat again because I’m going to smash his face in. According to him, that’s cheating because he’s not supposed to lose. Unfortunately, I’m going to cheat again. I’m going to kick his ass.”
Fury was expected to face Anthony Joshua 24-2 (22) in the northern summer before an idependent arbitrator ruled he was contractually obliged to face Wilder for a third time.
Fellow Brit Joshua, 31, lost his WBA, WBO and IBF heavyweight championships to former undisputed cruiserweight champion Oleksandr Usyk 19-0 (13) on points in Tottenham, England late last month.
The loss to the talented Ukrainian southpaw has taken some of the shine off a proposed Fury-Joshua bout, which was expected to be revisited next year.
