By Jim Calfa: Anthony Joshua says he’s hoping to “exploit” Jermaine Franklin’s weaknesses in his game this Saturday night to defeat him in their 12 round clash on DAZN in London.
Franklin (21-1, 14 KOs) has a style similar to Andy Ruiz Jr in terms of combination punching and punch resistance.
With that said, if Joshua (24-3, 22 KOs) is reckless against Franklin, we could see a similar result to his first fight with Ruiz in June 2019 in New York.
The one weakness that Franklin has besides size is his lack of punching power, but that might not matter. Joshua’s punch resistance is so weak that he’s likely to crumble under the shots from Franklin.
We saw former undisputed cruiserweight champion Oleksandr Usyk stagger Joshua early in their first fight, and he had him on the verge of being knocked out in the twelfth round when he unloaded with a flurry of punches.
It’s fair to say that if Usyk could hurt Joshua, so can Franklin because he’s a bigger puncher and throws better combinations.
“I think if Franklin possesses certain weaknesses, I’ll be able to exploit them,” said Anthony Joshua to the media. “It’s been difficult over the last few fights to exploit people’s weaknesses because they were very difficult to catch and pin down, so hopefully, I’ll be able to exploit Franklin’s weaknesses and show some of my old self.
“There’s a process. At a certain level, it’s hard to go in the ring and knock somebody out within 10 seconds. So there’s a process of me going in and getting a knockout.
“I think it’s crazy, but people have high expectations. People put their own expectations on other people, and they put me in high regard. So that’s where the pressure comes with me having to deliver, and I understand, and I’ll do my best for sure.
“This is kind of an indication of where you’re at. This is a fight. Let’s strip it to when we were getting towards a title. You’re moving in that direction again. So these are fights where I’m in contention, I’m a contender to get to a championship.
“So, I have to fight like I’m leading towards that. So the champions have to look at me like I’m a serious contender coming up. So that’s what that feels like now.
“So in terms of performance, I have to go out and do my best and do it better than anyone else.
“He’s been a great champion,” said Joshua about WBC heavyweight champion Tyson Fury. “He’s been entertaining for the public. He’s given us a lot of entertaining commentary and entertaining fights with Deontay Wilder, so he’s done well for himself.
“I’ll say that we tried to make that fight [Fury] three times. I was actually in training for that, and it fell through, and then we had this recent one where I had just lost, and he gave me a deadline.
“Yeah, I took it,” said Joshua when asked if he was serious about wanting to fight Fury last December. “Why wouldn’t he [Hearn] want me to go in there? I told Eddie, ‘Let’s look at the situation,’ but it was like, ‘You got this amount of time to get it done.’
“It’s difficult. It’s hard for when someone is trying to dictate to you and put you under that amount of pressure. I understand his [Fury] frustration. He wanted to get out [in December], but it wasn’t time permitted.
“I think now there’s no better time, Fury, provided the Usyk fight doesn’t happen, and he doesn’t fight me in between; I think he needs me at the minute. Maybe me, I didn’t meet his deadline,” said Joshua when asked why the Fury fight didn’t happen last year.
