Tyson Fury and Oleksandr Usyk have 10-minute stare down ‘in cul-de-sac of their own emotions’
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Tyson Fury and Oleksandr Usyk locked eyes for a full 10 minutes before their huge rematch on Saturday night as boxing chiefs struggled to separate the heavyweights. The Ukrainian holds the WBC, WBO and IBO heavyweight titles after beating Fury in their first meeting in May by split-decision and they are back in Riyadh to battle it out again.
![[Oleksandr Usyk v Tyson Fury 2 - Press Conference]](https://metro.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2024/12/GettyImages-2190710534.jpg?quality=90&strip=all&w=646)
Both men are unpredictable, sometimes jovial, sometimes off the wall, sometimes intense and it was very much the latter during the face-off on Thursday. The pair locked eyes for 10 minutes, with neither moving a muscle for most of it before they eventually resorted to trash talk and eventually separating.
![[Oleksandr Usyk v Tyson Fury 2 - Press Conference]](https://metro.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2024/12/GettyImages-2190065281.jpg?quality=90&strip=all&w=646)
They took a lot of persuasion to step away, though, with World Boxing Council President Mauricio Sulaiman stepping in after a few minutes but with no success. Sulaiman pleaded with the fighters but was ignored and requests to their security teams also fell on deaf ears.
After a good seven minutes of the stare down, veteran boxing broadcaster Steve Bunce said on TNT Sports: ‘They’re in a stand-off, a cul-de-sac of their own emotions. This is not going to be easy to reverse from. ‘They’re not going to break into smiles, shake each others’ hand, walk off and go and have a soft drink on their way to their hotel rooms.’.
However, eventually enough was enough, the two fighters were shepherded apart and the eye contact was eventually broken. Fury, typically, switched gears pretty quickly and went from incredibly intense to dancing with the crowd just seconds after breaking from the face-off.
