Homeless To Benefit From World Title Fight

Boxer Tyson Fury pledged to help the homeless in the UK with his £8 million earnings from his fight against Deontay Wilder on Saturday.

“When I go home I’m going to build some homes for the homeless and set up some funds for drug addicts and alcoholics,” said 30-year-old Fury. “I was always going to do it but being here (in California) gives me that extra push to go and do it even more,” he added.

Fury has been training in California and has been struck by the amount of homelessness in America’s most populous state.  In various areas of Los Angeles, tents can be found on roadsides, under bridges and in parks. In February, the Los Angeles Times reported around 55,000 people were without homes, a growth of 75% in six years.

“It has really opened my eyes to a lot of things and I’m leaving as a better person,” said Fury, who has been in California for around nine weeks. “It’s opened my eyes to see so many different cultures, so many different things happening and going on.”

“There are a lot of homeless people on the streets here, more than I’ve ever seen ever in my life. I’m staying in downtown LA but if you go five minutes down the road there’s like – I don’t know – thousands of homeless people. You think you might be in a third world country but it’s a crisis situation and something needs to be done about it. I’m just an outsider with an opinion but it’s a situation that is happening all over the world, especially in the UK as well.”

Around 17,500 tickets had been sold for the fight, but Fury says he’s not interested in the money. He just wants to be a boxer, and he would rather give his earnings to people who really need it.

While Fury could have kept the money for his family – he has a wife and four kids – he told the Irish Mirror he wants them to earn what they have: “I believe all kids should make their own money in life because if they don’t, they won’t appreciate it. I believe all kids should make their own money in life because if they don’t, they won’t appreciate it.”

“It’s easy to spend someone else’s money and the money I’ve earned is practically blood money. My kids have to make their own living and make their own way in life; they won’t be living off my name or reputation because that’s too easy a route. You see many of these rich people’s kids doing nothing because they had it too easy. I never had it easy, I had to work for whatever I got. I was working from very young, everything I wanted in life I had to work for.”