5th December, 2018
Anthony Joshua’s promoter Eddie Hearn says he wants to match him against Deontay Wilder or Tyson Fury in 2019.
Wilder’s position in landing the Joshua fight has been weakened with his controversial 12 round split draw from his fight against Fury last Saturday night at the Staples Center in Los Angeles, California. Wilder is still the World Boxing Council heavyweight champion though, and he has the title that Joshua needs for him to unify the division by possessing all four titles.
Hearn is no longer showing a preference in which of the two heavyweights he plans on trying to put together a fight with for Joshua next year. Although Joshua says he would still like to fight Wilder, he says he also wants the Fury fight and he’ll give him a “fair one.”
It’s unknown what Joshua means by saying he’ll give Fury a “fair one.” Does that mean a fair deal? If so, does that deviate from the offers that his promoter Hearn has been giving Wilder?
Joshua had this to say about his interest in fighting Wilder or Fury next:
“What took this fool so long? Like we ain’t been interested?!! 🙄Anyway well done Fury! they wanted to get you because they assumed you were finished!! I’ll give you a fair one when your ready! Either one of you!”
Joshua’s inability to line up fights against Wilder and Fury has put him in the backseat, as far as boxing fans go. Last Saturday’s Wilder vs. Fury fight hogged the attention in the boxing world with the spotlight on those two fighters. Joshua was ignored, a fighter that is on the outside looking in. The reason for that is Joshua and his promoter Hearn have content to fight the lesser guys like Alexander Povetkin, Eric Molina, Joseph Parker, Carlos Takam, and Dominic Breazeale. The only notable fighter on Joshua’s resume is Wladmir Klitschko, but he was 41 and coming off a 2-year lay-off and a loss to Fury at the time AJ fought him last year. Even then, Joshua almost got knocked out.
Hearn is going to Los Angeles this week to negotiate a fight between Wilder and Joshua. Fury’s promoter Frank Warren is said to be interested in putting together a Joshua-Fury fight. However, there’s a very good chance that Fury and Wilder will face each other in an immediate rematch in early 2019. That will leave Joshua having to face one of Hearn’s Matchroom stable fighters in Dillian Whyte or Jarrell ‘Big Baby’ Miller. There’s some interest from British boxing fans in watching Joshua fight Whyte a second time, but not so much from fans in the U.S. There’s no interest in seeing Joshua fight a guy that he already knocked out. Ultimately, Joshua is the one that decides on who he’ll face next on April 13.
Wilder is highly interested in fighting Joshua next, but only if it’s a deal that he feels is a fair one. Fury appeared to win the majority of the rounds against Wilder, but he was knocked down twice in the fight when the Bronze Bomber came on strong in the last four rounds to even it up. Wilder says he was only at half strength for the fight due to a broken right hand he’d suffered 12 weeks before his training camp. Wilder later needed surgery to repair the hand problem. Wilder was unable to train hard with his right hand during camp, he says.
That made it hard for him to sit down on his right hand punches during the fight with Fury. When Wilder did sit on his shots in the latter part of the fight, he had Fury in trouble twice. There’s no question that Wilder dominated the action during the championship rounds. Fury and his team have a hard time acknowledging that. Fury said after the fight, “The world knows who won.” The closer reality is that the boxing world is split in who they saw winning the fight. Some fans thought Fury deserved the decision based on looking like the better fighter throughout most of the fight. The other fans note that Wilder came into the fight as the champion, and he dropped Fury twice. As such, Fury didn’t do enough to take the belt away from Wilder. It wasn’t a convincing enough performance by Fury for him to take Wilder’s WBC title from him. Joshua will likely need to keep winning and wait until the smoke clears from the second Wilder vs. Fury fight before he gets a chance to fight the winner of the contest.
-Boxing News 24