His Excellency Turki Alalshikh revealed that tickets are now on sale for the December 21st Rematch between WBA, WBC, and WBO heavyweight champion Oleksandr Usyk and Tyson Fury for their Rematch at the Kingdom Arena in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia.
As Turki says, the Usyk-Fury 2 fight will “determine the title’s fate.” Unfortunately, the rematch will not be for the undisputed championship this time because Usyk no longer holds the IBF belt. So, it’ll be three belts instead of four, but the fight will still have a lot on the line, especially for Fury.
The 36-year-old Fury (34-1-1, 24 KOs) needs to avenge his 12-round split decision defeat against Usyk (22-0, 14 KOs) earlier this year on May 18th in Riyadh. Fury has Anthony Joshua waiting for a clash against him, and that fight will be tarnished if he’s beaten again by Usyk, especially if he’s knocked out this time.
Many fans feel that the referee saved Fury from a knockout in round nine of his fight against Usyk. The referee shoved Usyk out of the way, preventing him from finishing off the badly hurt Fury, who was helpless then.
In normal situations, the referee would have stepped and waved it off. In this case, the referee stopped the action and gave Fury a standing eight count. The time it took saved Fury from being knocked out. That little episode brought a black cloud over the fight, making some fans felt that Fury was given preferential treatment to keep the popular British fighter from getting knocked out.
Hopefully, we don’t see a similar fight-saving standing eight count in the rematch because it would be a bad look.
Tickets have been released for the highly anticipated fight that will determine the title’s fate between champions…🔥
Oleksandr Usyk and Tyson Fury in a new clash for the #Usyk2Fury heavyweight world titles 😍🥊December, 21 🗓️
Kingdom Arena 📍Book your ticket now 🎟️… pic.twitter.com/xzylP6fMnK
— TURKI ALALSHIKH (@Turki_alalshikh) November 6, 2024
“Fury started really good in the first fight, and won the majority of the handful of the rounds. I think he started to run out of steam,” said Demsey McKean to Secondsout channel about the Fury vs. Usyk first contest earlier this year on May 18th.
“I did hear Andy Lee talk about he didn’t have much sparring for that. So, maybe his conditioning let him down. I’m going to see if he comes in a lot more fit and a lot more conditioned in this fight.”
Coach Andy Lee’s comments about Fury not having sparring for his fight against Usyk last time sounds more like a team member trying to come up with excuses to explain away his loss. The reason Fury lost is because he lacked the skills, punch resistance, and youth to deal with the talent of the more athletically gifted Usyk. Again, Fury should have been knocked out in round nine.
“If he can kind of keep that pace up with Usyk, I think he should get the job done,” said McKean. “But I think Usyk is going to have a bit more experience and confidence. It’s going to be interesting to see how Fury bounces back after that loss. I’m edging toward Usyk.”
It may be worse for Fury in the rematch because the referee likely won’t step in to give him a standing eight count when he’s hurt by Usyk because they’re not going to want to deal with the fans’ backlash afterward.
“I wasn’t expecting Usyk to rock Fury because Usyk isn’t a massive puncher either, but look what happened. He landed a nice left hook clean, and that was all she wrote. It looked like for a moment that he was lucky to survive that round. A knockout could be warranted on both sides for sure,” said McKean.
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