{"id":819755,"date":"2026-10-31T12:42:08","date_gmt":"2026-10-31T12:42:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/819755\/"},"modified":"2026-10-31T12:42:08","modified_gmt":"2026-10-31T12:42:08","slug":"heavyweight-champion-says-tyson-fury-vs-anthony-joshua-shouldnt-be-for-a-world-title-killing-the-sport","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/819755\/","title":{"rendered":"Heavyweight champion says Tyson Fury vs Anthony Joshua shouldn&#8217;t be for a world title: &#8220;Killing the sport&#8221;"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>One heavyweight champion believes the WBA\u2019s controversial decision \u2013 to sanction Tyson Fury vs Anthony Joshua as a world title fight \u2013 is making a mockery of the sport.<\/p>\n<p>This has not been confirmed by the sanctioning body itself but, according to promoters Eddie Hearn and Frank Warren, the WBA \u2018super\u2019 title will indeed be on the line at Cardiff\u2019s Principality Stadium.<\/p>\n<p>The main criticism, it seems, is that neither Fury nor Joshua has merited the opportunity to become a three-time world champion, given their respective stoppages over Mariusz Wach and Kristian Prenga in July.<\/p>\n<p>Suffice to say, these were far from high-calibre opponents and, even before their latest outings, it could hardly be said that victories over Arslanbek Makhmudov and Jake Paul were particularly inspiring, either.<\/p>\n<p>Yet still it would appear that <a href=\"https:\/\/boxingnewsonline.net\/news\/fury-vs-joshua-now-for-world-title\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\">Fury and \u2018AJ\u2019 will collide for a major title<\/a> on December 11, while Murat Gassiev looks set to remain the WBA \u2018regular\u2019 heavyweight champion.<\/p>\n<p>Speaking with <a href=\"https:\/\/youtube.com\/shorts\/AoaBV0HguGg?si=8cZho1jrP1HoKyOX\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">The Stomping Ground<\/a>, IBF champion Filip Hrgovic said this decision by the WBA is making boxing seem like more of a circus than a sport.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThat\u2019s funny, man. It\u2019s a bulls**t decision. I don\u2019t know how they find [a] belt for that kind of fight. Who they fought in their last fights? They\u2019re both big superstars, but how are they fighting for a title?<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThese kinds of decisions are killing the sport; [they\u2019re] not good for the sport. Because of these funny decisions, people don\u2019t consider boxing a serious sport.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Unlike other champions, Hrgovic won his world title in an honest fashion as he <a href=\"https:\/\/www.skysports.com\/boxing\/news\/13578906\/filip-hrgovic-stuns-moses-itauma-with-epic-comeback-as-british-heavyweight-star-loses-unbeaten-record\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\">scored a stunning ninth-round finish over Moses Itauma<\/a> in August.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"One heavyweight champion believes the WBA\u2019s controversial decision \u2013 to sanction Tyson Fury vs Anthony Joshua as a&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":819756,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[41],"tags":[2560,101,56,54,55],"class_list":["post-819755","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\/819755","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=819755"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/819755\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/819756"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=819755"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=819755"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=819755"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}