Peter says he believed the referee made a “genuine mistake,” but said the fight should have been allowed to continue into the 12th round.
“I told Mark the same. I said, ‘You’ve made a mistake.’ And he said to me, which is very important, he said, ‘Peter, I didn’t hear the bell.’ I said, ‘Well, now that I believe because I didn’t hear the bell either,’” said Peter Fury to iFL TV.
“So he didn’t hear the bell. So he’s done what he’s done. I’ve got to give the fellow the credit. I don’t want to go and slate anybody. I told him I believed he made a mistake. We shook hands. It’s a sport. It’s boxing, and it is what it is.”
Fury said Verhoeven was hurt by the uppercut but still coherent after getting back to his feet, arguing the Dutch heavyweight should have been allowed to return to his corner at the end of the round.
“He stopped a world title fight from continuing. It stopped either Rico going to the points or it stopped Usyk from getting a clean KO that we will never know because when it come to the pinnacle of the fight, somebody’s interfered and caused a problem,” said Fury.
“Rico would have recovered decently. He was tired as well. He put a lot of work in. But he was coherent and he was well enough. He’s on his feet. He knew where he was. As soon as the referee stopped it you seen Rico’s response straight away. He was alert.”
Fury also revealed there was frustration within Verhoeven’s team over the official scorecards, saying they were told Rico “needed a knockout to win.”
“The way it’s all pointing is that no matter what, Rico needed a knockout to win, and we shouldn’t have that in boxing. So you got the referee doing what he’s done and the scorecards were abysmal as well, according to what I’m being told,” said Peter.
