Boxing: Tyson Fury pleads his innocence before crucial doping hearing

Tyson Fury has insisted he is innocent of any doping allegations as he prepares to attend a decisive hearing with the UK Anti-Doping Agency on Monday.

Fury’s legal team will argue that he should be exonerated over traces of a banned substance – reported to be nandrolone – showing up in a test 26 months ago. Fury went on to defeat Wladimir Klitschko nine months later to claim the No 1 heavyweight position.

“I’ve never taken a drug in my life,” he told The Daily Telegraph. “These people can say what they like but I’m suing them for what they have done to me. I have been messed about. They thought they had a villain and that they were going to take me down. I have been tested 50 to 60 times, sometimes three times in a week, blood and urine. This went on from way before the Klitschko fight.

“If I tested positive then why didn’t they ban me then? It never made any sense to me. I even had a meeting with them and they said I had nothing to worry about. Fifteen months later they say they are suspending my licence. None of it makes sense.”

Fury also expressed his amazement that he was tested by UK Anti-Doping officials in Spain three days before a hearing today, despite being unlicensed.

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“I was very shocked,” Fury said. “But they said they had come here to give me a random drugs test. With all that is going on, they still expect me to be super nice to them, so I was.

“I explained to them that I haven’t even got a boxing licence at the moment, that I’ve been out of the ring for 18 months, but UKAD were insistent on testing me on Friday. Perhaps they wanted me to say ‘go away’, so they could give me an automatic ban. I let them test me, I said go ahead, because I have nothing to hide. But it’s like harassment.”