Tommy Fury’s promoter, Frank Warren, has revealed the details as to why Fury’s scheduled fight against Paul Bamba was cancelled.
The 23-year-old light-heavyweight was due to fight American Bamba on the undercard of Floyd Mayweather’s exhibition against British YouTuber Deji Olatunji.
However, a day before the fight was scheduled to take place, rumours that Fury had missed weight were buoyed by him taking to the scales much heavier than his opponent. There was official confirmation that the clash had been removed from the card just hours before the event.
Bamba had weighed-in at 174.6lb, making the light-heavyweight limit, whereas Fury tipped the scales at just over 181lb – a full 6lb heavier than his opponent.
Frank Warren now reveals that the Brit did not in fact miss weight and there was instead a contractual error that meant the fighters were told different limits for the bout.
In an interview with talkSPORT, the Queensberry promoter said:
“What happened was, the promoters, who were putting the show together, issued a contract to Tommy [Fury] and it had a weight limit on there, that he had to make. The contract that they issued to the opponent, had a different weight on it, so the opponent came in on the weight on his contract and Tommy came in, I think it was 3oz over [his specified weight]. All he would have had to do is take his underpants off and he would have made the weight.
There was a big discrepancy, so there is lots of arguments going on, the guy saying he’s come in under his contractual weight and Tommy saying the same thing, which he did do. It just turned out a little bit messy but at the end of the day, he’s been out of the ring for a while now Tommy, albeit an exhibition he got that sorted out. I think the most important thing was that Jake Paul was there and Jake’s up for doing the fight and I think we’ve got a great chance of getting it on over in the U.K. now.”
Tommy, the half brother of WBC heavyweight Champion, Tyson, went on to fight Rolly Lambert in a lacklustre affair.
The focus for the ex-Love Island start has now switched back to a fight with Youtuber turned boxer, Jake Paul. Paul has given Fury and his team a 7 day ultimatum to get the contract signed and Warren seems confident the fight will happen next year in the UK.