Tyson Fury vs Francis Ngannou fight predictions including Conor McGregor

28 October 2023 , 10:30

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Tyson Fury is a long odds-on favourite to defeat Francis Ngannou tonight - and you’ll have to go a long way to find anyone backing the ex-UFC champion to upset the odds.

Fury is the best heavyweight of his generation and is one victory away from holding all four belts and becoming the division’s first undisputed champion since Lennox Lewis in 1999. Ngannou, on the other hand, is making his boxing debut in Saudi Arabia in what is his first of any description since he defeated Ciryl Gane to retain his UFC title almost two years ago.

Ngannou then left the UFC after failing to agree terms on a multi-million-pound deal and forged his own path which has led to tonight’s crossover clash with Fury. Here, the great and the good of the boxing and MMA worlds give their views on the historic clash…

Oleksandr Usyk

"This bout is bread and butter for Tyson Fury. This is my attitude with regards to boxing. And when someone’s saying that Ngannou can drop him I probably would agree, but I’m really not certain. Tell me how could the guy with no experience in boxing beat a giant who’s been in boxing for 20 years? Yes, Ngannou is a UFC champion, I’m not disputing it. But UFC isn’t boxing. I’m 100% sure that Tyson Fury will be victorious. If Ngannou relatively has a puncher’s chance, and if he hypothetically happens to send Fury tumbling to the canvas, I’ll concede talking gibberish."

Carl Froch

"I think it’s a ‘play fight’ and a bit ‘joke shop’ fight, which I’ve made my opinion quite clear on, regarding this Fury vs Ngannou fight - it’s not real boxing, it’s not proper boxing but I think we are now starting to understand it.

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"So people are going to watch the Ngannou fight with one eye on the shape and the performance - thinking of what’s around the corner with the fights quite close together.

"A bit of a masterplan, genius from Frank Warren, because at the end of the day, Fury is getting paid his career-biggest payday for a ‘move around’ and I’ve said before I’d have done the same in my career."

Amir Khan

“[Ngannou’s] size, if Fury leaves himself open - he leaves himself open a lot - he might get caught with a looping right-hander. With MMA fighters they’re going to throw punches from all different angles,” he told TNT Sports.

“Ngannou is going to jump at this opportunity because he’s fighting the world heavyweight champion in Fury. But realistically, Fury is going to win because he’s going to win because he’s the boxer, but Ngannou has got the puncher’s chance in this fight.”

Jake Paul

“I’ve fought all of these MMA fighters and none of them have been able to do anything against me. Tyson is going to bring the smoke but Francis has that one-punch knockout power so we’ll see if he can land on Tyson. It’s going to be a good fight and I’m excited for it.”

Conor McGregor

" Francis Ngannou is more of a kickboxer/boxer than he is a mixed martial artist in my opinion. You start throwing in grappling with Francis, it's never good for him, he has a striker's mentality and this will stand to him in this bout. He has a tough ask with Tyson Fury but any man can land a shot. Tyson does get hit, you would not know.

"It's going to be a tough ask but I'm excited to see it unfold. Tyson looks great in the build-up, fast, light, elusive. It could be a seriously stellar performance from Tyson Fury here and what's the variable? There's a few variables in this. The Mike Tyson influx into this in Francis Ngannou's corner is very interesting. Francis has power, big power, but with a striker's mentality if it gets a bit tougher for him in the later rounds that mentality will stand to him vs a mixed martial artist's mentality.

"With power, anything can happen. Mike Tyson in the corner, that type of style could be a kryptonite of a long, rangy, distance type of fighter and I don't think that Tyson's going to want to let Francis test his power on him. And has Mike Tyson given some tips to get inside, change an angle and bang a shot that clips the top of the temple to make it an interesting bout? You wouldn't know.

"Also, Tyson Fury is named after Mike Tyson, former youngest heavyweight champion of all time, icon in boxing and Tyson Fury's father John named his son after Mike Tyson; Tyson Fury. Fast forward a few years, Mike Tyson himself is now training a man to beat his son. That casts so much emotions into it and adds so much on to it, it heaps so much on to the story.

"So what type of energy will be in the building and what type of energy will the Furys be going into that bout with? Particularly John and Tyson. So it is a very interesting bout with all these things considered."