Tyson Fury has urged a former long-reigning heavyweight champion to draw the curtain on his career.
‘The Gypsy King’ shocked the boxing world when he announced his retirement from the sport at the beginning of the year, just weeks after he was beaten by Ukrainian superstar Oleksandr Usyk for the second time.
Fury had fallen short in his first encounter with Usyk last May when he set out to become the first undisputed heavyweight champion of the ‘four belt era’, but was beaten via split decision after a cagey 12-round bout in Riyadh.
After yet another entertaining yet close 12-rounds, Usyk prevailed once again to hand ‘The Gypsy King’ his second successive career defeat, which would prompt the 36-year-old to make the decision to hang the gloves up once and for all.
Fury has now spoken out and sent a message to former rival Deontay Wilder, urging the 39-year-old to follow suit and walk away from the sport after finding himself on a bad run of form.
Speaking to Pound 4 Pound with Kamaru & Henry, ‘The Gypsy King’ believes the brutal trilogy they shared has taken everything out of ‘The Bronze Bomber’ and says now would be a perfect time for Wilder to hang up his gloves.
“Being truthful I’d like to see poor old Deontay retire from boxing.
Since that trilogy we had, we took a lot of years out of each other’s lives. That war we had which ended in the 11th round by knockout, that takes a lot out of your tank and you don’t recover from fights like that. Between mine and Wilder’s trilogy, there was 10 knockdowns.
It takes a lot out of a fighter and even when he’s come back and had a couple of fights since against Joseph Parker and Zhilei Zhang, he’s only a shadow of his former glory. The only thing that’s the same about Deontay is his name. I’d like to see him retire for sure before he does damage to himself.”
Wilder has no plans on calling it a day and is set to return to the ring against Tyrrell Herndon on June 27, as he sets his sights on one last push to becoming a heavyweight champion once again.
