Carl Froch has heaped some high praise in the direction of a current champion, stating they could in fact go down as an all time great.
A hall of famer himself with wins over Mikkel Kessler, George Groves and Jermaine Taylor, Froch is arguably the British pundit best placed to make such a bold accusation.
Speaking on Froch on Fighting, the man on the receiving end of the flattering words was none other than WBC heavyweight world champion, Tyson Fury.
“Tyson Fury is the number one heavyweight in the world. He’s one of the few heavyweights you could take back to the previous era of heavyweights.”
“You could chuck him in with Mike Tyson, Evander Holyfield, Lennox Lewis, Riddick Bowe. I think he’s big enough and good enough to cope with all of them. Because he’s so big and so good.”
“If he carries on doing what he’s doing, and beats Usyk, he could be one of the all time great heavyweights. How about that?”
Whilst not without a degree of merit, Froch’s comments proved to be incredibly ill timed, as Fury’s public opinion is now potentially at an all time low.
Fans received the dreaded but unsurprising confirmation this week that an historic undisputed fight with Oleksandr Usyk would not take place on April 29th, and some within the boxing public have laid the blame at the door of ‘The Gypsy King’ – although others argue that it was Usyk’s team that eventually pulled the plug.
Usyk will now look to fulfil his mandatory obligations, potentially against WBA Regular champion Daniel Dubois, whilst it remains unclear as of yet what Fury’s next move will be.