By Scott Gilfoid: With all the big fights potentially on the horizon for him, Anthony Joshua is starting to feel worry about his title defense against former WBA heavyweight champion Alexander Povetkin this Saturday night in front of what is expected to be a big crowd at Wembley Stadium in London, UK. There’s a lot of good clean cash for Joshua to make if he can keep winning. Povetkin could put a damper on the gravy train if he knocks Joshua out this Saturday, and it’s unclear whether AJ’s clever promoter Eddie Hearn would be able to rebuild him if he loses badly.
There’s talk of 90,000 fans showing up this Saturday night to watch Joshua fight Povetkin at Wembley Stadium. That’s an absurd number for what shapes up to be a size and age mismatch in favor of Joshua. With that many boxing fans showing up to see a glorified mismatch, it shows that Joshua doesn’t need to fight the best in order for him to make tons of money.
Joshua’s promoter Eddie Hearn has been blowing his horn saying that Povetkin is the #3 heavyweight in the division behind AJ and World Boxing Council champion Deontay Wilder, but that’s not likely the case. Luis Ortiz is seen as the #3 heavyweight in the division, not Povetkin. You can argue that Povetkin isn’t even as good as Jarrell Miller, Dillian Whyte, Joseph Parker or Tyson Fury at this stage of his career. I would even go so far as to pick Joe Joyce and Oleksandr Usyk over Povetkin.
Joshua (21-0, 20 KOs) will be defending his IBF/WBA/WBO heavyweight ties against the 39-year-old Russian Povetkin (34-1, 24 KOs), who can still punch with more than enough power to knock the 6’6” AJ down to size. We just saw how much power Povetkin still has in his arsenal with his 5th round knockout win over the 6’8” David Price last March. It’s not just the knockout that Povetkin scored over Price that makes his power look so real.
It’s the damage that Povetkin did to Price’s face. Price suffered a broken nose and cuts that required 42 stiches to close, and that was in just five rounds of action. Just imagine what Povekin might have done if the fight had lasted the full 12 rounds. Joshua’s skin and nose are likely no tougher than Price’s, which means if Povetkin is able to land his power punches on Saturday, we could see a real bloodbath inside the ring on the night. Hopefully there’s a quality referee working the fight that allows Povetkin and Joshua to fight. The referee that worked Joshua’s last fight against former World Boxing Organization heavyweight champion Joseph Parker looked like he was working his first fight. The referee prevented inside fighting the entire night. He also allowed Joshua to call his own timeout at one point in the fight to walk over to his corner to have tape on his glove repaired.
Once the referee made it clear that he wasn’t going to allow inside fighting, the shorter 6’3” Parker never had a chance to win against the taller 6’6” Joshua. Povetkin, 6’2” is even shorter than Parker, so if the referee decides that he’s not going to have it with any inside fighting, then it’s going to be another easy fight for Joshua. I can’t imagine another referee not allowing inside fighting, but stranger things have happened. In Joshua’s fight before that against Carlos Takam in Cardiff, Wales last October, the referee Phil Edwards suddenly jumped in and stopped the contest in the 10h round while both fighters were battling. Joshua got a 10th round knockout win, and the boxing fans were furious at the strange stoppage by the referee, who looked like he had just woken up and didn’t have a clue what was going on inside the ring. I don’t know what it is about Joshua’s fights, but the decision making for the referees in his last two fights has left a lot to be desired.
”I think about losing. I can’t afford to lose,” Joshua said to skysports.com. ”The key to victory with me is relaxation, belief, having your energy reserves intact. I’m just trying to say I need to be a bit more effective, and sharp with my punches in this fight.”
Joshua shouldn’t worry about losing, because he’s going to lose eventually anyway. He’s not another Joe
Louis or Larry Holmes. Those guys were able to win for a long time before they eventually lost. With the careful match-making being done by Joshua’s wily promoter Hearn, he might be able to last another year or two before he finally gets knocked out, but it’s unlikely that he’ll stay unbeaten if he’s matched against a talented heavyweight in 2019. Joshua is one of those guys that you arguably need to knockout in order to win. Joshua fights at home in the UK all the time, and that means he’s someone that is hard to beat by a decision.
Joshua’s chin and his terrible stamina will always leave him vulnerable against good heavyweights or anyone with power. Joshua seems to be very worried about losing. Unfortunately, there’s not much Joshua can do about it, as he’s obviously going to lose sooner or later. His chin is too suspect and his stamina is something awful. Thus far, you can argue that Joshua has been incredibly lucky that he hasn’t been beaten, because he would have been knocked out by Wladimir Klitschko last year if the Ukrainian fighter had shown some common sense to finish him off after he was down on the canvas in the 6th and fighting on fumes until the 10th.
Joshua loses that fight if Wladimir had gone for the coup de grace. We can’t say what would have happened in Joshua’s fights against Takam and Parker, because the referees seemed spoiled the fights their oddball decision-making. Would Joshua have beaten Takam and Parker with different referees working the fights? Maybe, it’s hard to tell. If Parker was able to fight on the inside, he might have hurt Joshua and knocked him out, but we’ll never know for sure because the referee that worked the Joshua-Parker fight, prevented the two fighters from fighting in close. The decision by the referee to do that clearly hurt the shorter Parker’s game more than the taller Joshua, who was able to use his reach to dominate the fight on the outside with his jab.
Povetkin has a puncher’s chance of beating the 28-year-old Joshua this Saturday, but that’s it. If the fight goes to the cards, I can’t see Povetkin winning.