{"id":679530,"date":"2026-07-08T01:28:09","date_gmt":"2026-07-08T01:28:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/679530\/"},"modified":"2026-07-08T01:28:09","modified_gmt":"2026-07-08T01:28:09","slug":"moses-itauma-reacts-to-usyk-vacating-titles-and-planning-retirement-before-fighting-him","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/679530\/","title":{"rendered":"Moses Itauma reacts to Usyk vacating titles and planning retirement before fighting him"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Despite interest from fans and previous backing from boxing powerbroker Turki Alalshikh, Moses Itauma will almost certainly not have the chance to face Oleksandr Usyk before the Ukrainian retires.<\/p>\n<p>Usyk recently announced that he has vacated all three of his world titles and plans to have just one more fight before hanging up the gloves on a sure-fire Hall of Fame career.<\/p>\n<p>It means that there will be no opportunity for Itauma \u2013 very much considered the future of the division \u2013 to force a changing of the guard inside the ropes. The fight never did look likely, with Usyk saying that he would \u2018break\u2019 Itauma, despite his willingness.<\/p>\n<p>Speaking to<a href=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=aPfeV_pCAXc&amp;t=392s\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\"> IFL TV,<\/a> Itauma reacted to the news.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cTo be fair, he\u2019s earned his stripes. He was [undisputed] cruiserweight and heavyweight champion. At the same time, it made it difficult for all of us. But, now that they\u2019re all separated, we can start collecting some.<\/p>\n<p>On the <a href=\"https:\/\/boxingnewsonline.net\/news\/wilder-team-on-being-usyk-final-opponent\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">reports that the Ukrainian\u2019s final fight will come against Deontay Wilder<\/a>, the young Brit was less forgiving but says he understands the motivation.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWho\u2019d want to watch that? Fair enough, he\u2019s achieved more than I have, so I can\u2019t say nothing \u2026 He wants the paper. You\u2019ve got to remember, when Usyk was a cruiserweight and in his early heavyfights fights, he wasn\u2019t making as much money as he in these last couple of years. I don\u2019t blame him. He\u2019s from a country where boxing isn\u2019t as publicised as the UK or US, and I don\u2019t blame him for making the most out of what he\u2019s got.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Finally, asked if he was disappointed that they will never share the ring, Itauma said:<\/p>\n<p>\u201cHe\u2019s not really my generation, so I\u2019m not too bothered. Having fought [some] people in the generation before me, that\u2019s a blessing.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>What Usyk\u2019s decision does do is move Itauma one step closer to becoming a heavyweight champion at 21. <a href=\"https:\/\/www.bbc.co.uk\/sport\/boxing\/articles\/cqx1gy197wxo\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\">Next month, he faces world-level contender Filip Hrgovic<\/a>, with a win cementing his status as WBO mandatory challenger for Daniel Dubois as well as keeping an opportunity to fight Frank Sanchez for the vacant IBF title alive.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Despite interest from fans and previous backing from boxing powerbroker Turki Alalshikh, Moses Itauma will almost certainly not&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":613459,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[41],"tags":[2560,101,56,54,55],"class_list":["post-679530","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-boxing","tag-boxing","tag-sports","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/679530","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=679530"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/679530\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/613459"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=679530"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=679530"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=679530"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}