If the mercurial challenger can box clever in
Las Vegas next Saturday he stands a chance of winning
As Deontay Wilder must have imagined at various moments in their first world heavyweight title fight – memorable but inconclusive – there is more than one Tyson Fury. The most familiar is the
boxing beast, who lay flat on his back in a
Los Angeles ring 14 months ago, eyes shut, brain scrambled by connection with the electricity running through the American’s long right arm, before rising from the canvas in the 12th round like a wrestling actor to astonish the world and snatch a draw. He also shocked Wilder, who was certain he had done enough to make Fury his 39th knockout victim in 40 fights.
The second Fury is split in two. On nearly every day but Sunday, the Mancunian is engaged and physically alive, a dedicated pugilist. His commitment to his demanding, demented trade – spectacularly absent early in his career – could hardly have been better illustrated than when he stripped 10 stones of fat from his abused body to make a comeback in June 2018, after an absence of two and a half years. For 12 weeks, he has been a model of discipline preparing for his rematch with Wilder at the MGM Grand in Las Vegas on Saturday. Sundays are different. On Sundays his spirit dips. He is no longer a warrior, but a worrier.