Who Will Become Undisputed World Heavyweight Champion?
It’s been a long time coming but on May 18, Tyson Fury takes on Oleksandr Usyk in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. Five world heavyweight title belts will be on the line in this fight but just who will be the winner?
After months of negotiations and postponements, many will only believe this fight will take place when both boxers are in the ring. Usyk holds the WBC, WBA (Super), IBF and IBO titles with Fury being the WBC title holder.
Both boxers are unbeaten as professionals, though Fury has one draw (with Deontay Wilder) on his record. This is likely to be the first of two fights between the unbeaten pair. There is already talk of the Saudis promoting a massive card at Wembley Stadium in September. That could be Fury v Usyk II or the winner of the May showdown against former champion Anthony Joshua.
Tyson Fury hasn’t fought since his ten-round win over MMA fighter Francis Ngannou last October. That wasn’t the best of performances with him being knocked down in round three and only winning on a split decision. The fact that Joshua went on to beat Ngannou in two rounds makes Fury’s performance even worse.
Fury first won a version of the world heavyweight title in 2015. He never defended the belts won from Wladimir Klitschko and didn’t fight for another three years. During that time he put on over ten stone in weight, and had mental health problems. The weight was lost and his mental health gradually improved.
He finally returned to the ring and had a trilogy of fights with Deontay Wilder, finally winning the WBC title in 2020. He hasn’t defended the belt since December 2022 when comfortably beating Dereck Chisora.
It’s nine years since Oleksandr Usyk first became a world champion. It wasn’t at heavyweight though but the cruiserweight division. He unified the titles and since then has been attempting to do the same as a heavyweight.
Usyk had wins over Chazz Witherspoon and Dereck Chisora before challenging Anthony Joshua for the title in September 2021. He was a clear winner of that fight winning four world heavyweight titles.
The pair met again in Saudi Arabia 11 months later and again Usyk was the victor. It was a split decision though but he remained champion. His only fight since then was a controversial stoppage of Daniel Dubois last August.
Now the fight against Fury is finally set to take place. Usyk remains at the top of his game but Fury does look to have lost some of his speed in recent years. A thrilling fight looks likely in May and perhaps Usyk might walk away with all the belts.