Frank Warren has blasted back at deposed world heavyweight king Deontay Wilder after the American claimed Tyson Fury is not a real champion.
Wilder lost his WBC belt in February when he was battered to a seventh-round TKO by Ring magazine king Fury at the MGM Grand Garden Arena in Las Vegas. That was a rematch of their thrilling draw in Los Angeles in December 2018.
Fury and Wilder are now slated to meet for a third time after the latter exercised his contractual option for a further rematch – now scheduled for October after delays due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
The war of words is already hotting up with Fury’s promoter Warren fiercely defending his man in an interview with Express Sport.
Warren on Wilder excuses
“Wilder needs to go and put the television on, re-run the fight and see Fury is the champion, end of story,” said Warren.
“Everyone when they lose, there’s always an excuse. Going into it, he said he was the fittest he’d ever been, it is what it is.
“That first round was the 13th round really, he caught Tyson with two good shots and Tyson took them and out-bullied the bully.”
Warren has been promoting shows for 40 years now with a string of Hall of Fame fighters in his stable in that time, but even with his glittering CV he felt that Vegas rematch was one of the biggest of his career.
“I think it’s one of the most significant fights I’ve been involved with as a promoter in my time in boxing,” he said.
“For a British fighter it ticked all the boxes.
Fury vs Wilder 2 was a commercial success in the United States with the heavyweight division proving it can still draw huge interest. A paying crowd in the arena of almost 16,000 resulted in record live gate receipts for a heavyweight fight of $16.9m and the fight delivered between 800,000 and 850,000 PPV buys.
