Fury Calls Klitschko Comeback Rumours 'Crazy'

Tyson Fury has a simple explanation for why Wladimir Klitschko might come back at 50.

"It is crazy to think that, after the good career that he has had, now he wants to return at 50 years old back to boxing to win another world title. It's an addictive thing, more addictive than drugs, I suppose,” Fury

The man who ended Klitschko's nine-year reign atop the heavyweight division in Düsseldorf in 2015 — one of the sport's most significant upsets of the past decade — is watching his former opponent contemplate doing something that no heavyweight has done in the modern era.

Klitschko has not fought since Anthony Joshua knocked him out at Wembley Stadium in April 2017, a defeat that came eighteen months after the Fury loss and ended what had been a remarkably dominant second championship reign. He is 50 years old. The last nine years have not been spent in competitive boxing.

The rumours of a comeback were stoked last month when Klitschko posted a photograph with former Oleksandr Usyk manager Alex Krassyuk captioned "something big is coming." The combination of that post and Klitschko's known desire to leave on his own terms — the Fury and Joshua losses were not the endings he wanted — has given the comeback speculation enough oxygen to generate real conversation.

Spencer Brown, the manager of newly-crowned WBC heavyweight champion Agit Kabayel, has already declared his interest in the matchup. The commercial logic for Germany is genuine — Klitschko remains one of the country's most beloved sports figures, Kabayel is German-based with a significant following, and a fight between them for a belt Klitschko once held for years would generate the kind of event that boxing rarely produces outside of the Saudi Arabia circuit.

"Could you imagine that? Fighting for a WBC world title, which he held for a long time? It would be a historical fight and it would be huge. You wouldn't have a stadium big enough to fill that in Germany," Brown

Whether Klitschko is experiencing the same pull at 50, or whether the social media post amounts to something less than a genuine comeback attempt, will become clear in the months ahead.