When Tyson Fury claimed, days out from his fight with Francis Ngannou, that it would be like a “table-tennis champion” facing Novak Djokovic in a Wimbledon final, most fans agreed. And, in the end, Fury was right – it’s just he had the labels the wrong way round. Because in the third round, it was Ngannou who clubbed him with all the might of a Djokovic backhand, and Fury’s miniature bat offered no defence whatsoever.
As Fury lay on the canvas, the whites of his eyes bulging and outshining even the most ostentatious points of the evening’s opening ceremony in Riyadh, he was utterly humiliated. There really are no two ways about it. On this night in Saudi Arabia, Fury was hurt, disciplined, and embarrassed by Ngannou – the MMA star, the boxing debutant, one of the biggest underdogs in combat-sports history. The “Table Tennis champion of the world”, as Ngannou himself wrote on Instagram after this crossover contest.
