Previously unseen footage of Tyson Fury sparring Oleksandr Usyk’s next opponent released

Tyson Fury sparred Oleksandr Usyk’s upcoming rival Rico Verhoeven eleven years ago and a video of the session has now been leaked.

Usyk announced that his next bout would be a shock showdown with kickboxing legend Verhoeven in Egypt on May 23 in Egypt.

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The Dutchman has had just one boxing fight during his combat sports career, but is now set to challenge for the Ukrainian’s WBC world title in a remarkable opportunity.

Despite largely competing in the kickboxing ranks, Verhoeven has been in and around some of the sport’s best including in training.

That includes Usyk’s famous two-fight rival Tyson Fury, with whom he shared sparring rounds in 2015.

It was a pivotal training camp for Fury who was preparing for one of the biggest moments of his career, an eventual victory over unified champion Wladimir Klitschko on foreign soil.

Fury was trained by his uncle Peter at the time, who will now corner Verhoeven for his huge test against Usyk.

And he looked as accustomed in his career on top in the spar circling and boxing neatly on the back foot.

The ‘Gypsy King’ circled on the outside and used his long lever of a jab while Verhoeven took centre ring and tried to land on the illusive champion.

He did look positive in the ring, and did try to land some shots of note on the experienced Briton.

Verhoeven sported head gear, but it is clear his work was being valued for Fury at such a pivotal stage of preparations.

Nonetheless it is clearly valuable experience for the kickboxing icon, who at the time was at the peak of his powers as a GLORY champion.

Verhoeven – how did the Usyk fight materialise?

Verhoeven had been personally touted by Turki Alalshikh for a shot in the heavyweight division, after being put forward by actor Jason Statham.

A showdown with Anthony Joshua had been on the cards for February 14, but the Briton was involved in a car crash in December which removed the fight from the schedule.

And the 36-year-old believes it was simply a case of right place right time to get the shot of a lifetime.

“I finished [shooting a] movie at the beginning of December,” Verhoeven said.

“I had already planned a training camp in Spain for the whole month of January because the fight [with Joshua] was going to be February 14. Then the accident happened.

“We got on the phone and heard the fight might happen, but ‘AJ’ needs some time to recover physically and mentally.

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“Probably somewhere in March, we would hear more about it. Totally understand and totally respected the situation.

“We then came to the gym and my boxing trainer, Peter Fury [the uncle of Tyson Fury], said, ‘Hey, I was thinking — what about fighting Oleksandr Usyk?’

“They said one thing: ‘I love it. Let’s do it.'”