Tim Tszyu has hit back at Sebastian Fundora – and the American champion’s father Freddy – over allegations he continues to lie about their now infamous 2024 bloodbath, declaring: “Daddy says too f***ing much”.
Tszyu vs Fundora 2 & Pacquiao vs Barrios | SUN 20 JULY 10AM AEST | In the biggest fight of the year, Tim Tszyu faces Sebastian Fundora in a blockbuster rematch, plus Manny Pacquiao makes his highly anticipated return to the ring to face Mario Barrios. | Order now with Main Event on Kayo Sports
Speaking with Fox Sports Australia in Las Vegas this week, The Soul Taker also suggested the famed Fundora clan gives off “cult vibes” – and clapped back at the champ’s claims about him still suffering PTSD from their first encounter.
The shock explosion of bad blood is only going to build over the next 48 hours here in the world’s fight capital too, with the WBC title rivals still yet to collide at a massive press conference, open workouts and various other media opportunities.
As the excitement around Sunday’s MGM showcase continues to build, Tszyu has finally opened up on his now undeniable feud with that 6’6’’ champion dubbed ‘The Towering Inferno’.
Early last week, Fundora sensationally ignited hostilities when he claimed Tszyu was lying every time he talked of being “blinded” by blood in last year’s first encounter – which the Californian won via split decision.
The American has also since doubled down, suggesting it was his punches that caused the most significant damage to Tszyu, and suggested the Sydneysider even carried PTSD into his ensuing title loss against Bakhram Murtazaliev.
While Tszyu initially branded the champ a “bulls****er” in response, he has now spoken in detail about the sledges – and how he thinks his rival’s fighter and trainer, Freddy Fundora, is behind it all.
While the Australian is incredibly respectful of Fundora as a fighter – and the challenge he presents this Sunday – he is also refusing to simply sit back and let the usually quiet American take shots at him and his team.
Speaking recently with Main Event for a fight preview entitled ‘Sunday Bloody Sunday’, Fundora rejected suggestions Tszyu’s vision had been compromised by that nasty head wound suffered in Round 2 of their first encounter.
In fact, the champ insisted his rival had hardly been troubled by the wound, despite Tszyu clearly, and regularly, being shown wiping blood from eyes throughout the remaining 10 rounds.
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“The whole fight I saw him looking into my eyes,” Fundora stressed.
Speaking after a training session inside the Split T Boxing Academy this week, Tszyu was asked why he thinks Fundora has made the claims so close to their showdown – and what he thinks is the motivation?
“You know what it is?” Tszyu replied without pause, “it’s his daddy.
“Fundora has a father, his trainer, who likes to tell him a lot of different things.
“And the son, he listens.
“He’s just ‘yep, yep, yep’.
“I watched an ‘All Access’ preview to our fight, and it’s him with his dad, saying ‘yep, yep, yep’.
“The family, they live this weird lifestyle up in the mountains.
“(Laughs) It’s like a little cult.
“Gives me cult vibes.
“And I guess whatever daddy says, that’s what happens.”
Tszyu also suggests the lying accusations being levelled against him are a way of the Fundoras building confidence after everything that went down between them the first time around.
Apart from agreeing to face the now WBC super welterweight champ on just 11 days’ notice – following an injury to American Keith Thurman – Tszyu also suffered a nasty head cut late in round two after colliding with his rival’s elbow.
While the Sydneysider had dominated the opening six minutes and almost certainly broke Fundora’s nose – which the champ also now disputes – he was then seriously compromised by a gash that leaked blood and left him effectively fighting blind for 30 minutes.
Asked if the Fundoras were now branding him a liar as some sort of exercise in confidence building, Tszyu continued: “Oh, of course, they are.
“They need every ounce of confidence they can get (from that first fight).
“So they say I was hurt.
“Say I was suffering PTSD.
“But, no, it’s not real.
“When I actually heard what had been said, I thought ‘where is this guy coming from?’
“It was the same at our first press conference a few weeks back, when Fundora started talking about my team …”
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Specifically, Fundora seemed to be taking a subtle dig at Tszyu’s corner — and the criticism surrounding them both not calling off the first fight off or being able to stem the blood flow from that nasty head gash.
“We had a plan for the last fight,” the American declared at an event to announce the fight. “And we’ll have a plan for this one.
“Who has a better team, that’s who’s going to win the fight and for sure, my team’s better … I just have to listen to my dad and I’ll be great.”
To which Tszyu says what?
“It’s ‘my daddy says this, my daddy says that’,” Tszyu shrugs. “It’s like man, daddy says too f***ing much
“At the end of the day, it’s me and him.
“No teams, nobody else … when we step into that ring it’s just us.”
Tszyu’s longtime manager Glen Jenning has also expressed surprise as Fundora’s decision to go after his client verbally, but stressed he understood the motivations behind the “bulls***” claims.
Speaking in the Sunday Bloody Sunday preview, Fundora says of Tszyu: “The whole fight I saw him looking into my eyes.
“I didn’t think that cut was bothering him at all.
“(Tszyu was) maybe removing a couple of drops from his eyes, but it wasn’t too much of a thing.
“I remember him looking at me straight.
“It wasn’t for a second him blind or closing his eyes, (saying) ‘I can’t see out of my eyes’.
“He saw the whole thing the whole time.”
To which Jennings says what?
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“Look, I don’t know where Sebastian has got the idea from that Tim couldn’t see,” he said.
“Unless he’s got somebody who is telling him it’s happened to them and they could see, I don’t know.
“But there’s no way in the world.
“I’ve actually had two surgeries on my eyes for pterygiums and, because you’re awake during it all, I can remember looking up at the lights and being unable to see s***, everything was bright red because of the blood.
“And Tim would’ve been the same because the blood, it was pouring into his eyes.
“Which isn’t like water, either, it’s like oil.
“And you can see Tim pawing away at his face the whole fight, trying to wipe the blood from his eyes.
“I don’t know how you could see.”
So as for the motivation behind Fundora’s lying accusations?
“I just think Sebastian is probably sick to death of hearing people say how Tim Tszyu didn’t lose that fight – that the cut lost it for him,” Jennings continued.
“That’s hard to take when you’re the champion, when you’ve given things your best, won a split decision by one point.
“I think that’s why he’s saying Tim Tszyu gave the fight of his life and I beat him.
“He might just be stroking the ego a little bit there, giving himself some confidence.
“And I don’t hold that against him.
“I think most people would do that.
“That’s why he’s saying it was all bulls***.”