Roy Jones Jr. has refused to read too much into Tyson Fury’s performance against Francis Ngannou, heading into a potential undisputed heavyweight fight with Oleksandr Usyk.
The Gypsy King looked far beyond a man who is the WBC heavyweight champion of the world as he laboured towards a split-decision win over the former UFC heavyweight champion. Despite getting the win, there was a feeling that Ngannou had been hard done by on his boxing debut. The MMA fighter landed the more eye-catching shots, which included flooring the Gypsy King in the third round. Naturally, that led to suggestions that Fury may be on the decline. And yet, Jones refused to pay too much attention to the performance.
“Tyson Fury prepared as though he was fighting an MMA fighter who has no boxing experience. He didn’t come out there prepared to fight an Usyk-type guy or a guy like Ngannou who had everything to gain and nothing to lose. Tyson had everything to lose and nothing to gain, and guess what happened? He lost ’cause even in winning, he lost ’cause he didn’t look good. He had everything to lose, nothing in it to gain,”
“His head is where it always is. When he has a bad performance, he comes back and makes up for it with a beautiful performance. So, if they think that means that Usyk’s gonna beat him, they got another thought coming. That don’t mean that. He didn’t prepare like he was preparing to fight Oleksandr Usyk. He prepared like he was fighting a guy who has no experience in boxing,” Jones
Those comments do hold some weight when we look at Fury’s prior history. The Gypsy King has shown a tendency to fight at the level of opposition that he is facing. Nobody could foresee Fury’s remarkable performances against Deontay Wilder after having been out of the ring with mental health issues. And yet, Fury returned to arguably beat Wilder in the first fight despite the draw, and then stop the Bronze Bomber in the next two fights. And with the back against the wall, that is when Fury rises to the occasion.