By Eric Baldwin: IBF heavyweight champion Anthony Joshua isn’t leaning in any one direction for his next title defense of his IBF belt in November. While Matchroom Sport promoter Barry Hearn would like to see Joshua defend his title against former WBC heavyweight champion Bermane Stiverne next, Joshua says he’s willing to fight any of the top heavyweights in the division.
Joshua says he thinks a fight against Stiverne would be interesting because it would give him a chance to test his stamina to potentially go 12 rounds due to Stiverne’s excellent chin. Whoever the 26-year-old Joshua faces next, he’d like to have the fight take place in the UK so that he can take advantage of his huge fan base over there. He’d like to fight in front of British fans like he’d been doing.
“I don’t actually mind [who it is]; anyone, really. I don’t have anybody specific that I dislike or need to fight. It’s all part of the longer journey. My job is to make them look rubbish and make them look easy,” said Joshua to skysports.com. “It has to be [in this country]. This is the hot property right now and we’ve got about 13 champions in the UK so everyone wants to be here fighting.”
Joshua’s last fight was against American Dominic Breazeale on June 25 at the O2 Arena in London, England. Joshua battered the 6’7” Breazeale until dropping him twice in the 7th round. The fight was then stopped. Breazeale had talked a good game going into the match, but he didn’t do much to make it a fight. Breazeae looked and fought like he was afraid. If he had at least tried to make it a fight, he might have had a chance to win. But by just covering up and not throwing punches, Breazeale likely took more of a prolonged beating than he otherwise would have.
“I want to get out in November. I want to watch these guys in the Olympics and then get back in intense training and start preparing for my next fight,” said Joshua.
Stiverne would be a good fight if Hearn can negotiate the fight with his promoter Don King. It might not be easy to put the fight together quickly. If that’s the fight that Hearn really wants, then he needs to begin the negotiations soon so that they can work through any potential problems that might cause things to drag out slowly. Hearn would need a good Plan-B opponent to fall back on if he can’t get the Stiverne fight made.
Hearn has a tough job in trying to fight a suitable opponent for Joshua’s next defense. Hearn needs to think about Joshua’s Showtime contract in selecting a fighter that the American public is familiar with. At the same time, Hearn has to find someone that sells in the UK, because Joshua’s fights are now televised mostly on Sky Box Office PPV. Hearn can’t just put Joshua in with anybody if he wants the fight to bring in good PPV buys. Joshua’s popularity must continue to grow, and the only way to do that is to put him in with the best possible opponents each time out.