Oliver McCall vs. Frank Bruno lost his first defence against Mike Tyson and retired shortly afterwards. McCall returned to the ring 6 months later when he beat future WBC heavyweight champion Oleg Maskaev. In 1997 he fought a rematch again Lennox Lewis for the now vacant WBC title, which he lost in bizarre fashion as he refused to fight and started crying. Confirmed bouts: Oliver McCall vs. Frank Bruno Oliver McCall vs. Frank Bruno, billed as "The Empire Strikes Back", was a professional boxing match contested on 2 September 1995 for the WBC Heavyweight Championship. After Oliver McCall narrowly beat former champion Larry Holmes in
Lennox Lewis vs. Frank Bruno time that two British-born boxers had fought for the world heavyweight title, although Bruno had questioned how British Lewis really was, as he had won a gold medal for Canada at the 1988 Olympic Games as an amateur. Bruno described Lewis as "...not British", but said "It's about boxing. I'm sick and tired of his pretenses. He calls himself champion. He acts like he's a Sugar Ray Leonard or a Willie Pep or a Joe Louis", and that "Nobody cares about Lennox Lewis in Britain." To counter the Bruno claim that he was "not British", Lewis said, "What was I