Tyson Fury’s return to professional boxing against Arslanbek Makhmudov will take place in April at the Tottenham Hotspur Stadium in London, it has been confirmed.
The clash will take place on April 11. It will be the first time that the Gypsy King has boxed in the UK since his victory against Derek Chisora in 2022.
Fury announced his retirement a year ago following successive defeats against Oleksandr Usyk, but has been stepping up his training in Thailand ahead of his return to the sport.
It was originally hoped that Fury could fight at Old Trafford, in his home city of Manchester, but Manchester United‘s home game against Leeds in the Premier League on the same day made that virtually impossible.
Tottenham, meanwhile, travel to take on Sunderland that weekend, meaning that their ground was available for use. It has most recently hosted the highly-anticipated clash between Conor Benn and Chris Eubank Jr.
Last month, Fury confirmed on his Instagram page that he would take on Russian Makhmudov, with the fight shown live on Netflix. “Well it’s official I’m back doing what I (heart emoji) to do,” he wrote.
“I’ve brought the biggest network along with me @netflix @netflixuk this is going to be astronomical, Blessed by god.”
Days ago Makhmudov took to Instagram and shared a photo of himself with Fury. In the caption, he wrote: “10 years ago I took a photo as a fan, today we are already opponents in the ring! This is the moment when the dream comes true! And if the Lord has led this fight to me, he will bring victory for me.
Fury then responded in the comments with: “This was 2017 in Montréal, it was during my terrible time away from boxing. God works in mysterious ways and brings people together unexpectedly, whatever god has planned for us will be!”
The fight could potentially be seen as a warm up to a long-awaited fight with Anthony Joshua. But there is much uncertainty about whether that will now happen with Joshua involved in a car crash in Nigeria back in December.
The crash caused the death of two of his close friends and team members Sina Ghami and Latif Ayodele. Joshua has since returned to training, but no full decision has been made about a potential comeback.