By Scott Gilfoid: Unbeaten heavyweight talent Dillian Whyte (16-0, 13 KOs) is battling Commonwealth heavyweight champion Anthony Joshua (14-0, 14 KOs) this Saturday night at the O2 Arena in London, UK.
The two British fighters have met with each other numerous times in the past month to help build up their fight on December 12th on Sky Box Office. One thing that Whyte has noticed in his meetings with the 26-year-old Joshua is that he gets nervous when he’s around him. Whyte isn’t sure why Joshua gets so antsy.
My view is it could be Joshua remembers being beaten by Whyte from their fight in the amateurs, and he could be thinking about what another loss to him would do to his young career. With the way that Joshua’s promoter Eddie Hearn has been bragging about him left and right to the media, it would be tremendous blow to Joshua’s career if Whyte brings him back down to earthy by beating him on Saturday.
Whyte thinks that Joshua has been totally overhyped since he turned pro in 2013, as many boxing fans and media members see him as the next huge heavyweight star. Whyte says that Joshua is seen by the fans as the next Lennox Lewis.
“He [Joshua] gets nervous around me and then tries to turn it around on me and say that I’m the nervous one. But he gets very, very nervous around me,” Whyte said to skysports.com. “Joshua is the hero of the UK at the moment and I don’t expect people to be the same with me as they are with him. They’re billing him as the [next] Lennox Lewis or saying he’s better than Lennox Lewis – I don’t expect it to be 50-50.”
I totally agree with Whyte about Joshua seeing very, very nervous whenever he’s around him. You can read from Joshua’s body language that he doesn’t handle Whyte’s confrontational style very well. Whyte is the type of guy that speaks his mind and he’s not afraid to get into the face of someone he doesn’t like if they say something that irritates him.
During the ‘Gloves are off’ special between Joshua and Whyte, you could see how uncomfortable Joshua was. Whyte appeared to be in total control, and Joshua looked like he wanted to be elsewhere. I felt that Whyte totally had the upper hand on Joshua as far as his conversational skills went. On Saturday, we’re going to find out if Whyte has the upper hand on Joshua in the ring. We already know that Whyte beat Joshua once with his brawling style of fighting. On Saturday, we’re going to see if Whyte can whip Joshua for the second time.
“All people have to do is look into Anthony Joshua and they’ll see he’s a scumbag,” Whyte said. “He’s had a lot of media training and mind coaching and he brings it across well to the public and the media, but if you look deeper, you’ll see. He’s a robot and does what he’s been told to do and says what he’s been told to say.”
Oh boy, Whyte is really going after Joshua, isn’t he? I don’t know how much coaching Joshua has had from his promoter Eddie Hearn. His personality seems to be the type that doesn’t show a lot of emotion.
Whyte is really going to take the fight to Joshua and look to take him into the deeper waters on Saturday. Joshua hasn’t gotten to the later rounds yet, as Hearn has fed him awful opposition since he turned pro. All that muscle weight that Joshua has put on since he turned pro in 2013 could very well sink his ship on Saturday. Joshua looks like he’s been training for a bodybuilding competition in the last two years rather than in his boxing training.
At 250, Joshua is going to need to lug all that useless bodybuilding muscle around into the deep rounds, and it could very well slow him down to the point where he’s knocked out by Whyte. Heck, I think Whyte might destroy Joshua in the first six rounds, because few people have been able to go past the early rounds against Whyte. He’s a tremendous puncher with amazing talent. It’s going to be very difficult for Joshua to go deep into the fight given his lack of movement.
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