The manager of unified heavyweight champion Oleksandr Usyk clearly doesn’t think Tyson Fury is trustworthy.
Egis Klimas did not hold back from castigating the WBC heavyweight titlist Saturday after it was announced that Fury suffered a gruesome cut during sparring, thus forcing the postponement of the undisputed heavyweight championship set for Feb. 17 in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia.
The February date was itself a postponement, as Usyk and Fury were originally set to fight in December. But Fury underwent a tougher-than-expected battle against Francis Ngannou in his previous fight, compelling organizers to push the date a few months for Fury to recover from his wounds.
Enraged boxing fans accused Fury of pulling out on purpose, pointing to his history of scuppering high-profile fights.
Klimas, the longtime manager of Usyk, did not hold back.
“Tyson Fury is a f—ng coward who will do anything not to face Usyk, and he asked his b!tch to hit him with a frying pan in his brow,” Klimas told RingTV.com. “You can quote me word for word for that. When the news was brought to Oleksandr, he just smiled. That is all he did. He is too mentally strong to break.”
Not long after news broke of the postponement, Saudi power broker Turki Alalshikh announced that the new fight date would be May 18. Alalshikh presented the information alongside Fury in a video interview on The MMA Hour.
Boxing has not had an undisputed champion in the heavyweight division since Lennox Lewis defeated Evander Holyfield in 1999.
Saudi Arabia still has a high-profile fight in the offing. On March 8, Anthony Joshua will take on Ngannou.
And in the interview on The MMA Hour, Alalshikh confirmed that Artur Beterbiev and Dmitry Bivol will fight for the undisputed light heavyweight championship on June 1.
Sean Nam is the author of Murder on Federal Street: Tyrone Everett, the Black Mafia, and the Last Golden Age of Philadelphia Boxing.