Warren on Tyson Fury’s Future: No One is Going To Tell Him What To Do

Frank Warren says that Tyson Fury is under no pressure to decide on whether he will box again and says he feels we have not seen the best of him yet.

Fury was adamant that he would retire after his win over Dillian Whyte last month, although few believe he will stick to it and even his wife, Paris, and father, John, have said they believe he will box again.

Warren, Fury’s promoter, says he will not put any pressure on Fury to box again, but says that he would be far better off continuing his career now, rather than retiring and then coming back in a few years.

“Is he going to fight again? Who knows?” Warren said. “There is only one person who is going to make that decision and that will be him.

“Me, personally, I would not say to him ‘you need to fight’ because I would never go there with him. If someone’s not got it in their heart to fight, then they shouldn’t be in the ring because it’s the most-dangerous sport you can get involved in and you can get hurt.

“What I wouldn’t like him to do is retire now and then come back because he’s not reached his peak. He has no mileage on the clock and he’s only had two fights in two years.

“I look at him and I think that in two or three years later, he isn’t going to be at his peak. So, fight at your best, whatever you do, do it when you’re at your best.”

“I can’t tell him what to do, all I can do is give him the benefit of my advice. Whatever he decides to do will be for the benefit of himself and his family.

“Whatever he’s going to do, he’s going to do. I can’t tell him what he should do because he’s too intelligent for me to try and influence. He’s a very smart person, a very clever man.”

If Fury does box again, Warren does not see a boxer out there who can beat him.

“As much as the Whyte fight was a great event, it was a one-sided fight, he never lost a round,” Warren said. “He dominated that fight from the moment it was signed, not just in the ring.

“He is a master at how he gets into people’s minds psychologically. The only other two fighters who’ve done that in my time watching boxing, was Muhammad Ali, who was a genius and Mike Tyson in the early days how he intimidated people and 95 per cent of his opponents were beaten before they got in the ring.”

Fury has one fight remaining on his United States promotional deal with Top Rank, Warren said, although Warren’s Queensberry Promotions are his promoters in the UK and the rest of the world.

Despite suggestions from Mauricio Sulaiman, the WBC president, that he would talk to Fury soon about whether he would remain as WBC champion, Warren insisted there would be no point in having the conversation.

“Why would they strip him? He’s got no mandatory due,” Warren said. “The only time he gets stripped is if he doesn’t fulfil his mandatory and he’s just had one, that’s it.

“There’s nothing to assess. I don’t see any relevance because there’s no mandatory due, so what are they going to talk about.

“Listen, he may turn round and say tomorrow ‘You know what, I’m vacating the title’. He may want to do that.

“But no one is going to tell Tyson Fury what to do. The only person who will tell Tyson Fury what to do will be Paris or himself.”

Ron Lewis is a senior writer for BoxingScene. He was Boxing Correspondent for The Times, where he worked from 2001-2019 – covering four Olympic Games and numerous world title fights across the globe. He has written about boxing for a wide variety of publications worldwide since the 1980s.