Ngannou isn’t sitting silent as Tyson Fury ramps up the trash talk during ‘Knockout Chaos’ fight week in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia.
Francis Ngannou is facing Anthony Joshua this Friday March 8th in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. As if that wasn’t a big enough challenge for the former UFC heavyweight champion, he’s also having to deal with Tyson Fury trash talking him at every stop on their media tour (and some stops in-between).
During a media scrum, Ngannou discussed how Fury confronted him at Saudi matchmaker Turki Al-Sheikh’s home.
“When we met, he said I called him a coward,” Ngannou said. “And I said, ‘Wow, where did you hear that from? I never made that statement about anybody. I never called anybody a coward, unless you’re really a coward.’ But I don’t care to call a man that steps in the ring to fight another man a coward.’”
“‘Yeah, you said you beat me.’ I said, ‘Yeah, I did beat you – that doesn’t mean I called you a coward. But I did beat you.’ Then he was like, ‘Why does your record say 0-1?’ I’m like, ‘Well, if it’s about the record, I really start to doubt now if what your record says is true, because I did beat you.’ Then I think the argument was about that.”
“I had to ask him, ‘Why did your fight get postponed from December to February?’” Ngannou continued. “He said he got cut. I asked, ‘Did you slip on the floor or something?’ No, he didn’t slip. ‘Why did you find yourself on the floor in the fight? You didn’t slip.’ I had my statement to make.”
Ngannou then responded directly to Fury, who was firing back from his seat in the crowd at the media event.
“You’re going to sleep in the ring again, and I’m going to wipe the ring with your ass again,” Ngannou said. “You wiped the ring with your ass. There was blood in the ring, sticking to your pants.”
Ngannou also reminded Fury that he was giving up a lot of weapons stepping into the boxing ring.
“I’ll tell you, your only chance is in the boxing ring with the boxing rules,” he said. “When you step out of that ring, you better stay five meters away before you talk your s—, because if I lose it, you’re going to have a real bad time, my friend.”
“So, respect the fact boxing is protecting us and the rules of boxing are protecting us, because without that, you are nothing in front of me. I’ll beat you every day, twice on Sunday.”