By Craig Daly: Unified heavyweight champion Oleksandr Usyk and Anthony Joshua have two weeks to go before they meet for their long-anticipated rematch on August 20th in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia.
This is the fight that will determine whether the 32-year-old Joshua (24-2, 22 KOs) can redeem himself with a victory over the unbeaten Usyk (19-0, 13 KOs) or continue on in the downward spiral he’s been trapped in since 2019.
Joshua will be coming into the rematch with new trainer Robert Garcia in hopes that he can be his magic Genie to save his career, but it doesn’t look good.
Any changes that Robert will make to Joshua’s fighting style will be largely cosmetic and not in-depth enough to save him from his fate.
“Anthony Joshua vs. Oleksandr Usyk II for a piece of the heavyweight title. That’s two weeks from Saturday,” said Max Kellerman on Max on Boxing. “After he lost to Usyk last September, Joshua signed famed trainer Robert Garcia for the rematch.
Just TWO WEEKS to go! ✌
#️UsykJoshua2 #RageOnTheRedSea pic.twitter.com/coh7BJuRpd
— Matchroom Boxing (@MatchroomBoxing) August 6, 2022
“If they had a couple of years and a handful of fights together, I think Garcia could make a difference. But what can he really do in a short amount of time to change the outcome of the first fight?” said Kellerman.
“Experience, Max. He’s [Robert Garcia] worked with top fighter after top fighter, and when they had a pre-workout, I’m sure you had a guy Robert Garcia that saw something in Anthony Joshua that he could work with,” said Tim Bradley.
“You got to understand another thing. When you have a new trainer, you being a fighter, you come in with a sense of pride that you have to protect that trainer. You have to show up and show out because you chose this trainer for a particular reason.
“So, Anthony Joshua is going to come with a new motivation and another thing that Joshua is going to come with. He’s going to know how to do certain things. Garcia is a trainer that likes pressure and knows how to box on the outside.
“I’ve seen guys like Mikey Garcia, counter punchers, with punching power that he’s trained, his brother, and other guys like Bam Rodriguez. All these guys have different facets to their game because of Robert Garcia,” said Bradley.
