Ngannou Fought ‘The Worst Version’ Of Fury

Fury’s father John is extremely critical of Tyson’s performance and gameplan coming into the Ngannou fight.

At the Battle of the Baddest event in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, Francis Ngannou shocked the world by hanging with Tyson Fury for 10 rounds and nearly beating him. Hell, some fans of both men still insist that “The Predator” should have won.

But according to Tyson’s father John Fury, Ngannou didn’t fight the best version of his son that night. In fact, he believes that Tyson was nowhere near his usual self.

“Ngannou probably fought the worst version of Tyson I have ever seen, physically and mentally,” John Fury told GiveMeSports. “Even in the dressing room, his face was a funny color.”

It wasn’t just that night. Fury was sucking all week.

“I was watching him spar the week before, and I wasn’t impressed,” he continued. “His lungs were all over the place during the week, I was taking notes of how hard he was breathing after rounds. It could be where we were at, but things weren’t improving. He had a terrible week, one of his worst ever, but he still did enough to win.”

This may sound like John Fury is trying to diminish Ngannou’s performance, but he’s really more slagging his son’s lapse in game planning and preparation.

“If Tyson wasn’t able to go back to the old version of him in the later rounds, he was f—ed,” John said. “But he hadn’t been training to do that, and he was instead trying to throw bombs.”

“I saw it coming, and I knew this would happen. What was he doing trying to blow him away? He wasn’t giving it his full wit, his full concentration, and he thought it was going to be easy because people were telling him that.”

Tyson will need to be on top of his game in February when he takes on Oleksandr Usyk to unify the heavyweight titles. After that? It sounds like a rematch against Francis Ngannou is the plan, but nothing is for certain. Let’s keep our fingers crossed that we’ll get to see “The Predator” in the ring or cage before the end of summer 2024.