Carl Froch believes Tyson Fury suffered a cut in a freak sparring accident earlier than his team have stated.
It was claimed the incident happened last Friday but Froch says the recovery of the cut suggests it happened at least a few days before then.
It was announced last Friday evening that the mega undisputed fight between Fury and Oleksandr Usyk set for February 17 has been postponed.
The Gypsy King sustained a cut above his right eye in a sparring session with Croatian heavyweight Agron Smakici.
Carl Froch has questioned the timing of Carl Froch's cut
Queensbury Promotions/Youtube
Promoter Frank Warren said at the time that the injury occurred on Friday morning.
He told talkSPORT: "It happened this [Friday] morning in sparring with a Croatian heavyweight who caught his eye with his elbow."
Footage leaked later on the same evening which appeared to show the moment Smakici unintentionally caught Fury with his elbow.
Froch has poked fun at the grainy footage of the spar, suggesting it was filmed on an old Nokia phone.
And he has also revealed that he believes the incident actually happened well before Friday.
Speaking on Monday, after examining Fury's stitched cut on Instagram, Froch says he felt the healing process suggests the injury occurred between a week and 10 days ago.
Froch told talkSPORT: "Why is he sparring the way he is? To start with, I wasn't sure about the cut, I wanted to see him stitched up.
"After seeing Tyson Fury on Instagram, the cut to me doesn't look like an acute injury, it looks like an injury that's healing, it's scabbed over, and the swelling has already come down and the bruising is showing.
"It looks about a week to ten days old, what significance that has I don't know... But have they been sitting on this for the timing to be right to give the news?
"And that sparring footage, it may or may not have been the right footage, but it must have been filmed on a Nokia 8210.
"Because it was blurry, it was horrible and then we never saw the cut after he got elbowed.
"He definitely got elbowed in the face in that sparring, but where's the clear footage and the cut, when did it happen?"
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Tyson Fury's team say he suffered the cut last Friday morning
Queensbury Promotions
Meanwhile, Froch's former rival George Groves also gave a sceptical response.
He questioned how Fury sustained such a deep cut in sparring and believes he could have entered the ring earlier than the rearranged date of May 18.
Groves said: "I've never seen a cut that bad from sparring. Sometimes you get a tiny little [cut], you do get bruises, and then there's a tiny nick.
"But it doesn't even bleed, but will be gone in a couple of days, it doesn't even need a stitch.
Carl Froch reckons Tyson Fury's recovery suggests the injury happened earlier than Friday
"He's had a lot of scarring over his eyes, he's had bad cuts before, it might be the same eye I'm not sure, but to get that bad of a cut in sparring, it's unlucky.
"Because that's not a cut you can quickly get over, don't get me wrong, if he really wanted to fight, he could have stitched it up, get stitches out in five days, do your best to heal it as best as you can, stick a load of Vaseline on it.
"It would likely open in the fight, but you could still get through the fight, and I'm sure there will be dozens and dozens of fighters that would be testament to them getting just fight fit, passing the doctor to be able to box.
"But maybe that's just a sign of Fury still believes in himself and that the most important thing for himself is to just beat Usyk, he's not in it for the money, he is willing to park whatever that mega pay day was and delay it."
