Dull Fury must bide his time for Joshua
YOU can’t blame a guy for trying but Frank Warren’s claim that Tyson Fury would merit a 50-50 split of any purse from a fight with Anthony Joshua is so audacious, it’s a surprise he wasn’t cast for a role in that film about the Hatton Garden heist. Joshua is the bearer of so many belts he struggles to lift them, while Fury’s sole boast is to be the No 1 bogeyman and lineal champion — two titles that do not enjoy a finite presence. Lineal champion can supposedly be traced back to the first of all, John L Sullivan, but with the division so fractured is an increasingly empty claim. Sullivan lost to James J Corbett, who was beaten by Bob Fitzsimmons, who lost to James J Jeffries and on we go from 1885 to the present day. It seems simple: the man who beats the man who beats the man. Yet leaps of faith are also required. Lennox Lewis, for instance, retired as champion in 2004. Wladimir Klitschko was announced the new lineal champion in 2009, bridging five years in which Chris Byrd, Roy Jones Jnr, Corrie Sanders, John Ruiz, Lamon Brewster, Vitali Klitschko, Hasim Rahman, Nikolai Valuev, Siarhei Liakhovich, Oleg Maskaev, Shannon Briggs, Ruslan Chagaev, Sultan Ibragimov and Samuel Peter — as well as Wladimir Klitschko — had all been declared heavyweight champion by various governing bodies. Klitschko’s elevation involved beating Chagaev to hold the WBA, IBF, WBO and The Ring belts — but that isn’t all of
them. Lineal is far from undisputed. And Wladimir Klitschko never fought, let alone beat, Lewis — whereas Rahman did, before losing a rematch. So the whole thing is utterly confused, including Fury’s lineal claim, having defeated Klitschko. For while Fury has not since lost his titles in the ring, he most certainly did lose them — whether relinquished or stripped from him, as a result of a hiatus that was in part due to a failed drugs test. We cannot pretend that dereliction of duty did not happen. Put it like this: if Fury had a visible belt, he would brandish that, rather than utilise the smoke and mirrors of lineal glory. And while Fury is a gift on social media, he is a dull boxer compared to Joshua, whose last three fights have been watched live by close to 250,000 people. Joshua has given the heavyweight division its present credibility, saved it from drug cheats and circus shows. He is the draw here, Fury the foil. That doesn’t mean he wins — Joshua is certainly vulnerable and Fury, on his game, a shrewd fighter — but it does afford him the bigger purse if the match is made. If Fury does not like that he can offer his lineal crown up to the highest bidder, and see who will pay better money for it.