Tommy Fury calls off fight with Darren Till over safety concerns ESPN

Tommy Fury has called off his fight with Darren Till, citing that the former UFC star will not "abide by professional boxing rules."

The bout was set to take place as eight rounds at heavyweight on Jan. 18 in Manchester but Fury, the younger brother of former heavyweight champion Tyson, has now said on social media the event is off.

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Fury wrote on Instagram on Friday: "For the one simple reason being that Darren has stated over and over that he does not want to abide by professional boxing rules and that if he is loosing the fight he will resort to kicking and other stupid MMA tactics.

"I am a professional boxer, I have been out of the ring for over a year and I wanted this to be a great BOXING fight for the fans.

"I have wasted weeks in training camp. We are working hard to get a new opponent and date.

"I promise to get a better opponent and better fight for you guys. Good news around the corner."

At the news conference for the fight in November -- in which the fighters had to be separated after a mass scuffle broke out -- Till said he would kick Fury (10-0, 4 KOs) in the head during the bout.

The fight would've been Till's first under professional boxing rules, he previously held a 18-5-1 record in UFC where his last fight ended in a loss to Dirc du Plessis. That was in December 2022 at UFC 282, before that Till had some other big nights in the octagon, beating Donald Cerrone and Kelvin Gastelum and going the distance with Robert Whittaker.

He was released by the UFC in March 2023.

Fury meanwhile told ESPN last month that a rematch with YouTuber-turned-boxer Jake Paul was "inevitable."

Till, who has said he would like to make his way back to the UFC one day, insisted he made the comments about kicking Fury's head as a "mental warfare tactic."

"I've just got to the gym now to do my sparring," Till said in a video on X. I've just been shown a post that Tommy Fury's not fighting me because I threatened to kick him in the head. I said I'd kick him in the head at the press conference as a mental warfare tactic.

"Since then I haven't said anything else, I've been hard at work at the gym preparing for this boxing match..."

"I said to everyone Tommy was going to pull out regardless of anything. I knew it since the press conference, so now it's confirmed what I said.