It is a figure that discombobulates the mind every bit as sharply as a right hook to the temple. When Tyson Fury fights Oleksandr Usyk in Saudi Arabia for the WBA, WBC, IBF and WBO world heavyweight championship belts in the early hours of Sunday morning, local time, he will reportedly earn a guaranteed £81.5m. And if pay-per-view sales are rosy enough, it could even balloon to more than £100m.
It is a brain-swelling amount of cash. Yet as both men prepare to step into the ring in Riyadh, history is also on their minds. Because, for the first time since Lennox Lewis defeated Evander Holyfield in November 1999, boxing is about to get another member of a very exclusive club: that of undisputed heavyweight champion.
