Did Fury’s lack of discipline lead to another Usyk loss?

Gareth A. Davies says Tyson Fury’s nutritionist said he was in “excellent condition” for his rematch with unified heavyweight champion Oleksandr Usyk on December 21 in Riyadh. Davies claims Fury’s conditioning was “brilliant”.

Wasted Camp

The 281 pounds Fury (34-2-1, 24 KOs) didn’t look “good” and he certainly didn’t look “flashy” unless we drastically lowered the bar for a fighter to meet that criteria. He looked like a retired, out-of-shape former athlete taking it easy.

Tyson looked like someone who had been sitting on the sofa eating cakes and pies for the past three months. It looked like she was carrying around 30 pounds of excess fat that shouldn’t be around her waist. This is a discipline problem.

For the ‘Gypsy King’ to go through a three-month training camp and look like this, he suggests these things:

• He didn’t work hard
• Trim corners
• eat too much
• Not enough cardio

For this important fight, the Fury should have weighed no more than 247 poundsthe weight he entered for his historic win Wladimir Klitschko on November 28, 2015. Fury has never weighed in at 240 since that clash, and hasn’t looked this good in any of his fights over the past nine years.

Lack of discipline

This tells you that Fury lacks discipline because he should have been able to cut into the mid-240s if he’s worked hard and controlled his nutrition. Call it laziness, but he hasn’t pushed himself to get the weight off. That’s why Usyk has beaten him twice and will likely lose to Anthony Joshua if this fight happens next.

“Furia improved, but so did Usyk. His conditioning for a 20-stone man was brilliant,” said Gareth A. Davies Boxing King Media on Tyson Fury’s fitness for his rematch with Oleksandr Usyk on December 21.

“I talked to his (Fury) nutritionist and they said he was in good shape and had a great camp. He showed that in the fight. Usyk was a little smarter. There were times when Fury, the giant, he was trying to beat this smaller guy, and he went in and out and landed right before he went out in those clinches in the last third of the fight.

“It was a close fight, it was definitely a close fight. It was very physical, an intriguing contest. It wasn’t an exciting one-minute fight, but it was very intriguing. It was a grueling fight for the two men. They’ve been through 24 grueling tests together,” Gareth said of Fury and Usyk.

The last two fights between Fury and Usyk were not grueling encounters. Usyk worked over Tyson in the ninth round of their first contest on May 18, but that was the only action-packed round of the 24 rounds they fought where many punches landed. Both of their fights were chess matches, not grueling fights.

The fury has NOT improved. I don’t know what Gareth is talking about. He has steadily gotten worse and seems unable to beat any of the top heavyweights. Usyk is a good fighter, but some top 15 would have beaten him in his last two fights. He beat Fury and Anthony Joshua because neither of them are elite or level A. In their prime, they were overrated, but now they are even worse.

“There’s an obvious fight for Fury (Anthony Joshua) but not for Usyk. The obvious fight for Fury is Joshua but for Usyk, will he fight Daniel Dubois again if he beats Parker? Will he fight Parker if he beats Dubois on February 22 and win the undisputed title again? That seems like the obvious route, but other than that, what else is there for him (Usyk)?” Gareth said.

Usyk will likely fight the winner of the fight between Daniel Dubois and Joseph Parker. Eddie Hearn is pushing for Usyk to fight cruiserweight Jai Opetaia, but that’s not likely to happen. Opetaia is a name for casual boxing fans, and it’s not a fight that would go down well. If Turki Al-Shiekh wants to fund a battle between these two, that would be great, but other than that, Usyk is better off fighting the winner of Dubois-Parker to regain his undisputed championship.