Sources: Fury, ill with Covid-19, forced to postpone third fight with Wilder

Heavyweight title fight will be delayed until October

Heavyweight champion Tyson Fury has tested positive for Covid-19 and has symptoms of the coronavirus, which forced his third fight with former titleholder Deontay Wilder to be postponed on Thursday, according to multiple sources.

Fury and Wilder were due to meet in the main event of a joint ESPN/Fox Sports pay-per-view event on July 24 at T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas in a fight Fury was forced to accept due to an arbitrator’s recent ruling binding him to the bout instead of his preferred undisputed title fight with three-belt titlist Anthony Joshua on Aug. 14 in Saudi Arabia.

Now, the Fury-Wilder III show has been postponed and the two fighters will have to wait a bit longer to meet again, probably until early October, according to sources.

Top Rank, Fury’s co-promoter with Frank Warren, and Premier Boxing Champions, which represents Wilder, did not confirm the postponement on Thursday, preferring to wait to make it official along with the new date being locked in, according to a source.

Sources said Fury came down with symptoms and tested positive and that at least three others associated with his camp also tested positive: Fury assistant trainer and former middleweight world titlist Andy Lee, unbeaten featherweight and close Fury friend Issac Lowe, who was due to box on the undercard, and former heavyweight titlist Joseph Parker, who is trained by Lee and has been with him in camp.

I broke the story of the fight being postponed and that Fury had tested positive for Covid-19 — he has had one vaccine shot but never got his second — for World Boxing News. Please read the full story here: https://www.worldboxingnews.net/2021/07/09/fury-deontay-wilder-3-postponed/

Photo: Mikey Williams/Top Rank