Boxing: Mike Tyson apologises after uncomfortable interview with Piers Morgan

Mike Tyson said tiredness was the reason for a bizarre appearance on Good Morning Britain that left some viewers questioning if he was high on drugs – and others concerned for his wellbeing.

On an endless promotional tour ahead of his return to the ring, Tyson was incoherent and hard to watch as he mumbled his way through an interview with hosts Piers Morgan and Susanna Reid.

"I just wanna do this, I plan on doing this for a charity (inaudible)," Tyson began one response. "And I think I'm capable of doing that and that's what I wanna do."

The 54-year-old has put his body through a punishing training regime to lose 60kg in preparation for an exhibition fight against fellow boxing legend Roy Jones Jr next month.

And the former heavyweight champion said it was late-night exhaustion that led to a series of slurred answers.

WARNING: Language

What is going on with Mike Tyson? Tired, Punch Drunk or too much Charlie? 🤔 pic.twitter.com/PgzhQedoEa

— Clara Welch (@ClaraWSparkles) October 13, 2020

That was a shambles....🤦🏾‍♀️🤦🏾‍♀️🤦🏾‍♀️ live him but he needs to lay off the ganja 🤣🤣🤣🙏🏽🙏🏽🙏🏽 pic.twitter.com/dk2L0Efcn6

— Naomi Sullivan (@NayNaySullivan) October 13, 2020

"Hey mate … I tried to stay up late for interview but fell asleep and like a lion I'm hard to wake once asleep," Tyson tweeted to Morgan. "Training hard and going to bed early. I had no monitor so I couldn't see you guys and forgot to look into camera."

"No problem, Champ," Morgan replied. "We could see you were a bit weary! It was very late in LA. Appreciate this message as some viewers were concerned."

Morgan was slammed by fellow UK journalist Mike Graham for allowing the interview to go ahead in the first place.

"I'm going to ask him (Morgan) when I see him 'did you get this wrong?'" Graham said. "What on earth were the producers thinking?

"I have producers here … if they had seen the state of Mike Tyson they would have said 'we can't put him on, he's going to look ridiculous, it's not going to be helpful, it's going to look like we are trying to make something out of this and are proving ourselves to be the wrong kind of journalists'.

"This man is clearly not in a fit state to be on television … his head falls down at one point in the interview."