Fury ready to return and reclaim his world belts

Tyson Fury has set his sights on reclaiming the world heavyweight title after being cleared to fight again immediately.

Fury is free to resume boxing after a compromise on his positive test for the banned steroid nandrolone was found with UK Antidoping (UKAD), resulting in a two-year ban which has been backdated to December 2015.

That means Fury, who has returned to training and faced the UKAD hearing alongside cousin Hughie, can challenge for Anthony Joshua’s unified WBA, IBF and IBO titles.

“I’m a fighting man through and through and I’ve never backed down from anyone in my life. I was certainly not going to back down from fighting this dispute,” Fury said.

“Hughie and I have maintained our innocence from day one and we’ re now happy that it has finally been settled with UKAD and that we can move forward knowing that we’ll not be labelled drug cheats.

“I can now put the nightmare of the last two years behind me and next year I will be back doing what I do best, better than ever and ready to reclaim the world titles which are rightfully mine. It’s time to get the party started.”

Fury and his cousin Hughie tested positive for the banned steroid nandrolone in February 2015 but were not charged by UKAD until June 2016, by which time Tyson Fury had beaten Wladimir Klitschko to become undisputed champion.

Both Hughie and Tyson Fury have strongly denied the nandrolone charge, claiming the positive was a result of eating wild boar that had not been castrated.

As part of the compromise deal, UKAD withdrew a charge against Tyson Fury of failure to provide a sample in September 2016.

Chief executive Nicole Sapstead explained the delay over charging the Furys was a result of the complexities of proving nandrolone abuse, but denies UKAD had taken the easy option in reaching a compromise.