Tyson Fury’s promoter Frank Warren can count his lucky stars he’s still alive after being shot by a balaclava-clad thug.

Warren, 71, has been around the boxing scene for many years and suffered his fair share of ups and downs. He’s now known as Fury’s promoter, though has also represented the likes of Frank Bruno and Ricky Hatton.

It was back in 1989 when Warren was 37 when the promoter was working on a show at Barking. Though it did not have the ending he hoped for.

Frank Warren is now Tyson Fury’s promoter having been around the boxing scene for many years (Image: Getty Images)

“I wasn’t even meant to be at the show,” Warren told the Independent. “As we get out of the car, I hear a bang. I think it’s a car backfiring.

“I look around and see this fella with a balaclava, and I hear a click. I think it’s a joke. Next minute, there’s another bang, and I feel this pain in my side.”

Frank Warren was shot in 1989 in Barking (Image: PA)

With ambulances on strike, Warren was bundled into a police van and taken to a hospital in Shooters Hill. Though he was not out of the woods just yet given the damage inflicted by the bullet.

“I can feel them cutting my clothes off, brand new bloody suit I’ve got on,” Warren adds. “I say to my uncle, ‘Don’t let them knock me out!’ I felt, if I’d got knocked out… That was the only time I thought I was going to die.”

Police told Warren’s wife Susan the promoter had just a ’50-50 chance’ of survival – but he pulled through.

Frank Warren was Frank Bruno’s promoter (Image: Press Association)

Indeed, Warren was back working within three weeks having discharged himself from hospital after losing about three stone in weight.

No one has ever been sentenced for the shooting with Terry Marsh, who had become Warren’s first world champion two years before the attack, having been acquitted by a jury.

Warren is still at the top of the boxing promoting game, and recently collaborated with Eddie Hearn on the Day of Reckoning card in Saudi Arabia.