By Scott Gilfoid: IBF heavyweight champion Anthony Joshua (16-0, 16 KOs) says he wants to capture all of the world titles, and he’s not satisfied with his career as it is right now with him having won only one of the four titles in the division. For Joshua to capture all the belts, he’ll need to defeat the winner of the July 9 fight between IBO/WBA/WBO heavyweight champion Tyson Fury (25-0, 18 KOs) and Wladimir Klitschko (64-4, 53 Kos).
Joshua will also need to defeat WBC heavyweight champion Deontay “Bronze Bomber” Wilder (36-0, 35 KOs). That’s not going to be easy because The 6’7” Wilder is taller, faster and a bigger puncher than Joshua. Wilder doesn’t back up against the ropes like most of Joshua’s opponents do.
“I’m nowhere near where I want to be. “I’m pretty satisfied with how far I’ve come – but I’m nowhere near where I want to be,” said Joshua to the dailystar.co.uk. Everything that’s happened since turning pro has been designed to end with me as the unified heavyweight champion of the world.”
Joshua shouldn’t take his eye off his next opponent Dominic Breazeale (17-0, 15 KOs), because that’s a fight that he could very well lose unless he brings his A-game and is totally focused on the task at hand. Breazeale, 6’7”, is as big as Wilder, and he’s got decent pop in his punches. Breazeale isn’t the biggest puncher in the heavyweight division, to be sure, but he doesn’t need to be for him to KO Joshua.
All Breazeale needs to do is make sure he puts hands on Joshua, and he needs to make sure he throws a lot of punches in the last six rounds. The way to eat Joshua is to throw a mess of punches like Roberto Cammarelle and Erislandy Savon did in their fights with him in the Olympics. Both fighters appeared to defeat Joshua in the eyes of a lot of boxing fans, but they weren’t given the decision. The 2012 Olympics took place in London, England.
“I don’t feel that I’ve even scratched the surface of what I can achieve and that’s why when I beat Charles Martin I didn’t celebrate wildly because I’ve only had one world title fight, one world title win and one world title belt,” said Joshua.
It’s going to be very hard for Joshua to win all the belts because there’s so much that can go wrong for him. He’s only fought one good fighter during his short pro career and that was Dillian Whyte, who fought with an injured left shoulder from the 2n round on. We don’t know what Joshua will do when he gets inside the ring with someone that has the talent to nail him with shots, and keep him on the outside where he’s less agile and not able to land his power shots. Like a lot of heavily muscular fighters.
“I want all the belts and I know that there is a lot of work to be done to get there, but I’ve got a great team behind me and I think that I will get there,” said Joshua.
Joshua is going to need to beat Breazeale, and then hope he can get the winner of the Fury-Klitschko fight. I’m not sure Joshua can get the winner of that fight yet. As for Wilder, his promoter has already said that Joshua needs to fight in the U.S and make a name for himself.
Joshua isn’t a big enough name right now in the U.S for a fight between him and Wilder to resonate with the American boxing public. Wilder is better off letting the Joshua fight marinate for a few years to see if he can become a bigger name so that the fight can be on PPV in the U.S. Wilder would be short-changing himself if he were to take the fight with Joshua fight now because he’s too much of an unknown.
Instead of Joshua thinking about collecting titles, he needs to show that he can beat his mandatory challenger in Joseph Parker. Joshua also needs to beat some of the other top fighters like Kubrat Pulev and Luis “The Real King Kong” Ortiz because those guys would be very tough outs for him. I see Joshua-Ortiz and Joshua-Pulev as 50-50 fights.