Evander Holyfield was ‘ready to bite Mike Tyson in the face’ until a higher power told him not to

Evander Holyfield was ready to bite Mike Tyson “back right in the face” during their infamous 1997 bout only to decide against it due to a higher power that spoke to him before the fight.

The two former heavyweight champions have teased a return to the ring to face each other in a trilogy fight, despite 57-year-old Holyfield hanging up his gloves in 2011 - six years after Tyson’s last fight of his career.

The pair have buried the hatchet over their controversial rematch 23 years ago, when Tyson got himself disqualified in the WBA heavyweight title fight after biting both of Holyfield’s ears on one of boxing’s darkest nights.

Tyson, now 53, was upset with what he felt were deliberate headbutt from Holyfield that left him with a cut to his eye at the end of the second round, and came out of the third round without his gumshield in what appeared to be a deliberate attempt to bite his opponent. After Holyfield clinched Tyson following a barrage of punches, Tyson took a chunk out of Holyfield’s right ear, earning himself an initial disqualification before referee Mills Lane reduced the sanction to a two-point penalty - only after a doctor cleared Holyfield to fight on.

However, the fight was called off when Tyson bit Holyfield on his left ear at the end of the round, setting in stone one of the most ugly finishes to a fight in boxing history.

Speaking as talk of a third fight continues to swirl, Holyfield has revealed how he was initially overcome with rage, but turned to his faith in God to convince himself not to respond with similar actions to Tyson.

“You know, the thing is this prophet told me (before the fight) ‘Mike is going to do something bad to you in this fight’,” Holyfield told BBC Radio 5 Live. “He said ‘he’s going to do it, but you gotta keep your mind on the Lord, that’s the only way he can get you, if he gets you distracted’.

“Mike threw elbows, he hit you with his shoulders, he did a lot of this sneaky stuff. But you know, I just thought that was a part of boxing.

“But when he bit me on the ear, I knew that wasn’t (part of boxing), and I was really, really upset. He almost got me because I was going to bite him back right in the face.”

Holyfield did need some help from his corner to calm down and not retaliate against Tyson - who went on to completely lose his cool and scrap in the ring with others and leap into the crowd after a bottle was thrown at him.

Having lost a piece of cartilage from his ear, Holyfield wanted to do much worse to Tyson, but three voices helped to convince him otherwise in his trainer, the voice of his grandmother and the higher power who spoke to him before the fight.

“Since the prophet told me these things were going to happen, I told my corner guy (before the fight) that ‘if he does this stuff, remind me of what the prophet told me’,” Holyfield added.

“And so all I was thinking about was I was going to bite him back, but my corner guy kept saying ‘keep your mind on the lord! Remember what he said!’

“I didn’t want to remember, because I wanted to bite him back and let him know that I was mad too and all of a sudden it came to my mind what my Grandma said: ‘you know revenge is the lord’.

“I thought about it, and I told myself not to bite him. And I told Mike, one day we were at an interview together, ‘you know what I been ready to bite you right there on your fat cheek’.

“He said ‘you were gonna do that?’ and I said ‘yeah, but it came to my mind what my Grandma always told me’ and it changed my whole life, because the bout could have been over, the two best boxers biting each other!”

Tyson was fined $2.4m for his disqualification and stripped of his boxing licence, and never won a world title again as his career deteriorated both in and out of the ring, while Holyfield went on to fight a further 20 times before eventually hanging up his gloves at the age of 48.