PATTAYA - Former world heavyweight champion Tyson Fury forced Polish opponent Mariusz Wach to retire in a tune-up bout on Friday for a hoped-for showdown later this year with fellow Briton Anthony Joshua.
The fight in Pattaya was not televised, but will feature in the Netflix reality show At Home with The Furys. About 1,500 fans attended the event at the Max Muay Thai Stadium in Pattaya.
It was Fury’s second win in as many contests this year as he returns from a 16-month layoff.
Wach had lost seven of his last 10 fights, and the 46-year-old could not continue at the start of the eighth round. Fury, who turns 38 in August, has won 36 professional bouts, suffering his only losses in two fights with Ukraine’s Oleksandr Usyk in 2024.
Joshua, also a former world heavyweight champion, was set to face Kristian Prenga of Albania in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia later on Saturday.
The bout will be Joshua’s first professional fight since being involved in a car crash in Nigeria in December that killed two of his friends, Sina Ghami and Latif Ayodele.
His last competitive appearance in the ring was his knockout loss to IBF world champion Daniel Dubois at Wembley Stadium in September 2024.
The date for what would be a blockbuster fight between Fury and Joshua has not yet been finalised. Both fighters are tentatively targeting October or November, but nothing has been signed so far.
