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Men’s Boxing The Homecoming: Fury v Whyte

JOHN WIGHT discusses the continuing fallout over the Kinahan controversy, and the shadow it casts over one of the most anticipated bouts in modern British boxing

DESPITE the ongoing controversy swirling around Daniel Kinahan and his involvement in top-flight boxing while allegedly running an international drug cartel and criminal organisation, said to be responsible for a raft of murders in Ireland and in Spain, there does happen to a major boxing event taking place this weekend.

Billed as The Homecoming, a sold out Wembley Stadium will host Tyson Fury’s first outing in Britain in four years, where he will face fellow Brit Dillian Whyte for the WBC title Fury ripped from the grasp of Deontay Wilder two years ago. 

There is history between Fury and Whyte, what with the latter spending a significant amount of time as one of Fury’s regular sparring partners a decade ago. There is also an understandable sense of grievance on the part of Dillian Whyte, who only managed to get this shot on the back of the legal action he took against the WBC over their refusal to mandate the fight as per their obligation given that he was Fury’s WBC mandatory challenger, a position he has held for the best part of five years.

Whyte’s animus towards co-promoters Bob Arum and Frank Warren, who won the right to stage the event on the back of a mammoth $41 million purse bid – the largest ever made for a fight – has been evidenced in his lack of co-operation in helping to promote it, culminating in his non-appearance at the ritual media workout earlier this week. 

In particular, Whyte has made clear his disdain for the 80-20 split in Fury’s favour, which tells its own story as to whom the WBC, Arum and Warren view as the star of this particular show, and he will be consequently fired up to make mugs of all three.

Tyson Fury is currently riding the proverbial crest and comes in as firm favourite. His height and reach advantage over Whyte, slick boxing skills and vast hinterland of experience operating at this level, places him in pole position to retain his title. Basing himself in his home town of Morecambe in preparation for Wembley, by his own account he has put in a tough eight-week camp in anticipation of the best version of Dillian Whyte possible stepping into the ring to face him. 

Given Fury’s ability to switch things up, it will be interesting to see how he approaches his work this time round. Unlike Wilder, Whyte is not a man who buckles under pressure and with this in mind it’s more than likely Fury will opt to stay on the back foot and try to keep him at range, perhaps upping the pace in the late rounds in anticipation of Whyte tiring, as he’s done in previous fights in which he’s entered deep waters. 

Fury, who is also the current Ring Magazine champion, really is a man who defies logic. His ungainly and fleshy physique belies a fighter who possesses the sweetest skills and best engine in the division, whose feet are extraordinary for his size, along with his speed. If as he has stated repeatedly this really is going to be his last fight, what more fitting a goodbye than going out in front of 94,000 fans at London’s Wembley Stadium.

Dillian Whyte opted to base himself in Portugal for his training camp and looks ready. Hailing from Brixton by way of Jamaica, the self-styled Bodysnatcher has come up the hard way, eking out a living on the margins of the sport for many years, where, with no amateur career to speak of, he learned his trade on the job. 

Adversity makes the strong stronger and the weak weaker, so they say, and adversity has stalked Dillian Whyte all the way from when he was a youth engaged in gang violence in south London, during which he survived being stabbed and shot, and on into the fight game, in which he has received no favours from anyone. He will be intent on breaking Fury up on the inside and turning proceedings into a grinding war of attrition, seeking opportunities to land his renowned left hook and do what no other fighter who’s faced the Gypsy King ever has by stopping him.

But no matter the buzz generated by this mammoth boxing event, the pall cast over it by the Daniel Kinahan controversy has been inordinate, regardless of the attempt by those involved in the promotion, up to and including Tyson Fury himself, to shut the subject down whenever it’s come up during fight week.

Thus far Fury’s only comments on the matter have been to say that it’s none of his business, nothing to do with him, none of his concern. Considering that the US government has just labelled Kinahan as a narcoterrorist — a man whom Fury has lauded as a personal friend and adviser in the past, and in whose company he was photographed in Dubai as recently as February — this stance, though extraordinary, will have been taken on the back of legal advice. 

Fury, it should be said, has not been implicated in any criminal activity.

On a wider note, Fury’s refusal to be drawn in accords with the concerted attempt by boxing as whole to take a vow of omerta when it comes to Kinahan’s involvement in the sport at the highest level, again doubtless on the back of legal advice. However the gravity and seriousness of the move by the US, UK and Irish authorities to take down the so-called Kinahan Organised Crime Group dictates that this will only ensure that the issue won’t be disappearing anytime soon.

Indeed, the fast pace of events following the joint press conference in Dublin has been reflected in the announcement by MTK Global, the management company Kinahan co-founded with former British middleweight champion Matthew Macklin in 2012, that it is to cease operations at the end of this month, citing “leading promoters” contacting the company to confirm that they will no longer work with MTK fighters.

With around 300 fighters on their books, the impact of this development will resonate across the sport for some time to come.

This is undoubtedly a critical time for boxing. Its image has taken a severe battering and, yes, while those who exist in the bubble of trust at the apex of the sport – promoters, managers, fighters and trainers – will be counting on the apathy of the average fan to deflect from the Kinahan affair, there will also be an abundance of trepidation with regard to what will happen next.

While Kinahan will not be ringside in person at Wembley on Saturday night, his presence will certainly be felt, and for all the wrong reasons so far as the sport’s now bruised public image is concerned. 

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