KELLIE HARRINGTON has blasted John Fury for an ‘absolutely sick’ sexual remark he made about Jake Paul’s girlfriend.
Fury’s son Tommy is set to box the YouTuber next month and their latest press event got out of hand when John and Jake traded vile insults.
Paul was appearing via video link and got under Fury Sr’s skin when he continually interrupted him.
It led to Fury taunting him with an explicit insult about his partner Julia Rose.
Even by boxing press conference standards, where off-colour comments are often made, it was over the line and drew gasps from the crowd while Tommy put his head in his hands and older brother and WBC king Tyson looked away.
The controversial moment went viral and drew criticism from many figures in the sport including Ireland’s Olympic gold medalist.
She fumed: “Absolutely sick, and very disrespectful. Wow. The bad side of social media.”
Ireland’s other most famed boxing icon, Katie Taylor, has similarly criticised the trend of these bizarre bouts involving YouTubers.
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They often centre around drumming up controversy in the build-up rather the fights themselves being quality sporting contests.
When asked about Jake’s brother Logan fighting KSI back in 2019, she made her feelings clear on how this fad has infiltrated what is one of the world’s oldest and most historic sports.
She said: “I think it makes a mockery of the sport, in that these two YouTubers are headlining a big show.
“But it’s all about a business, I understand that, but I’m just interested in the purity of the sport I love. Fighters going toe to toe together.
“This is our lives. This is something that we’ve trained towards since we were 10 or 11 years of age.
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“We’ve had these amateur competitions. We’ve stood in the dressing room not knowing who we were going to fight.
“We’ve put our bodies on the line week in, week out for years and years now. I love the fight game, I love the purity of the sport.
“There’s something very noble about going into the trenches against your opponent.
“I just love that side of the sport, I don’t like the other side of it.”