TYSON FURY has been labelled a “diva” and slammed for “ducking” Oleksandr Usyk by former world champion Tim Bradley.
Negotiations for an undisputed heavyweight clash between Fury, 34, and Usyk, 36, have broken down after they failed to reach an agreement to fight on April 29 at Wembley Stadium.
Usyk had surprisingly agreed to take just 30 per cent of the pot for the first bout, but wanted a 50/50 split in the rematch.
This was something Fury refused to agree to as the teams could not come to a mutual agreement.
And American Bradley, 39, a two-weight world champion, has criticised Fury for his part in the bout not taking place.
Speaking to ESPN, he said: “This Fury issue. He’s become a diva in my eyes, a huge diva.
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“Fury understands now that he can sell out arenas, and it doesn’t matter who he fights.
“I asked him in the past, ‘What about legacy?’ He’s like, ‘I don’t care about legacy. I care about that money. Forget the legacy.’ I feel like he doesn’t really want the Usyk fight at all.
“He will get in there with Joe Joyce or whoever it is, and he can control everything, and he can pay them a little amount of money and go from there.
“A small piece of me feels like Fury doesn’t want to fight Usyk because it’s almost like remnants when he fought against [then 39-year-old Wladimir] Klitschko [in 2015], and he won the heavyweight championships, won all the belts and then went on that downslope.
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“There was nothing else for him. There’s no doubt about it. He ducked him.
“Fury is the one to blame. I’m sick of the mess. I call this a legitimate duck by Fury, he’s ducking Usyk. He didn’t think Usyk was going to take 70/30. The goalposts got moved again, they kept getting moved.”
Last week, Tommy Fury came out to defend his brother’s actions in the Usyk clash falling apart.
And he insisted the bout between the two undefeated heavyweights WILL happen.
He told Soccer AM: “He (Tyson) does not like Usyk at the minute. Listen, there’s a lot of politics involved in boxing, but I want to say this first-hand.
“The reason why this fight isn’t getting made isn’t down to Tyson at all. He wants to fight and he’s proved to everybody… he’s gone and fought Deontay Wilder after three years out.”
He then added: “He’ll fight any man. He doesn’t fear any man, especially not a cruiserweight who can’t do anything anyway.
“You know he’s too small. What’s he going to do? It’s not Tyson’s fault. I think all of these fights will happen, but it just takes a while to get made.”
Source: Boxing - thesun.co.uk
