On Tuesday morning, a Tyson Fury vs. Francis Ngannou crossover superfight was officially announced, ending months of speculation as to whether Ngannou would tempt any of the top boxing heavyweights to fight him.
Now we have a trailer for the event, which will take place on October 28th in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. The video was dropped by Ngannou himself, who included a quote for those who believe he’s going to get smashed by Fury when they step into the ring together.
“Never doubt a man with hope and faith,” Ngannou wrote.
That hope and faith came in handy over the past year and a half as Ngannou managed to exit his UFC contract and become a free agent. He signed with the PFL, promising a 2024 return to MMA. But for 2023 he was looking for a big money fight against a top heavyweight.
Unfortunately for him, none of the four top heavyweights were too eager to fight him. Tyson Fury teased a fight between the two for months, only to clam up when Ngannou became available at the start of 2023. Anthony Joshua labeled the idea of fighting “The Predator” a “gimmick.”
Deontay Wilder sounded interested, but has been targeting an Anthony Ruiz fight next. And Oleksandr Usyk is too busy fighting mandatory challengers to his many belts. Add in a proposed December night of superfights in Saudi Arabia where Fury would fight Usyk and Joshua would fight Wilder, and Ngannou was looking very left out in the cold.
That all changed when Saudi Arabia’s plans changed.
“First of all, this whole division was stagnant, stagnant,” Fury’s promoter Frank Warren said when explaining the Ngannou match-up. “Everybody was waiting for a big show in December. We were told, a couple of weeks ago, that this is being pushed back to the autumn of 2024. So what are supposed to do? Sit around waiting? They said nothing could be done in Saudi. Well, something is being done in Saudi.”
So don’t think this was a sure thing for a while now. Tyson Fury only picked the Francis Ngannou crossover fight back up after the much-hyped big money December event fell apart. Ngannou has been sitting on the sidelines with nothing to do but have hope and faith.
That hope and faith worked out for him, and now we’ll see what it can do for the heavy-hitting former UFC champion in the boxing ring on October 28th.
This story originally appeared on MMA Mania
