By Charles Brun: Anthony Joshua’s replacement opponent is expected to be announced by today for his tune-up fight on DAZN PPV this Saturday, August 12th, at the O2 AArena in London.
According to Garett A. Davies, the event could be canceled due to problems with finding a suitable replacement on short notice.
With tickets having already been purchased by boxing fans, who had hoped to see the former two-time heavyweight champion Joshua (25-3, 22 KOs) face Dillian Whyte in a rematch, they won’t be pleased if a low-level fringe contender or worse, a 40+-year-old second tier fighter is brought in as the substitute.
What compounds the problems that AJ’s promoter Eddie Hearn is dealing with is this event will be shown on DAZN PPV, meaning that Joshua’s opponent must be credible and viewed as having at least a fighting chance of winning.
The names floated for Joshua’s fight on Saturday:
- Robert Helenius – 39 years old
- Gerald Washington – 40
- Agit Kabayel
- Dereck Chisora
- Demsey McKean
While those names are obviously disappointing, Joshua’s original opponent, 35-year-old Whyte, is almost as bad. Dillian had basically lost 3 out of his last 4 fights if you count his controversial win against Jermaine Franklin as a loss.
Joshua’s opponent to be announced today
“I would have expected so. I’ve been on the text with Eddie Hearn, and my understanding was over the weekend that Gerald Washington, Dereck Chisora, and Demsey McKean were in the frame. I think McKean has been ruled out because he’s a southpaw,” said Gareth A. Davies to iFL TV about Anthony Joshua’s opponent for this Saturday, August 12th, at the O2 Arena in London.
It’s hard to fathom British boxing fans wanting to pay to watch Joshua to fight 39-year-old Chisora, yet they did in droves last year when Derck fought Tyson Fury.
They even filled the 65,000-seat Tottenham Hotspurs Stadium in London in their eagerness to watch Fury defend his WBC heavyweight title against the journeyman Chisora.
If UK fans were willing to pay to watch Fury destroy Chisora, it’s fair to say they’ll do the same with Joshua.
“Joshua has been preparing for a right-hander or an orthodox stance fighter in Dillian Whyte. I’m also hearing that [Agit] Kabayal and Manuel Charr may be in the frame,” Gareth continued. “Andy Ruiz has put himself forward.
“I don’t think they’ll take Hrgovic on such short notice. That’s unlikely, but you’d expect it to be today. Hearn hasn’t confirmed to me the timing of the announcement, but fingers crossed.”
There is zero chance that the unbeaten Filip Hrgovic would be used as a replacement opponent for Joshua because that’s a guy that would be a massive problem for AJ, even with an entire 8-10 week camp.
“He says it will be today, but there’s no timing on that yet. I was just reading a message from Hearn now, who reckons it’s not going to be [Gerald] Washington. I’m absolutely confirming that, but I still think it might be him,” said Davies.
Well, it’s good to know that the 40-year-old Washington won’t be used as Joshua’ss opponent, but still, you can’t put it past Hearn from using that guy.
“Here’s the logic, okay. If it’s Gerald Washington, it’s not going to do pay-per-view numbers on the DAZN, in my view. They might struggle to get a decent number,” said Davies. “If it’s Dereck Chisora, they probably still can do it as a DAZN pay-per-view, in terms of the business, because maybe that does 100,000 or 150,000 pay-per-view buys.”
That’s an enormous number of buys for a train wreck-level fight between Joshua & Chisora. They should pay the boxing public to watch a fight like that.
Saturday event could be canceled
“There is some jeopardy there. Dereck’s still a live opponent. Whether that’s viable and whether this interview that David Haye did has veracity to it at all. I don’t know that Dereck was in training to fight Joshua. They’re very close, though, Chisora and Joshua,” said Gareth.
What David Haye said in an interview about the possibility of Chisora being Joshua’s opponent has to be dismissed because of their close friendship and the fact that he used to be Dereck’s manager.
“So I just wonder whether that is actually doable. He’s been a big brother and a mentor for a very long time. I’m not sure he wants to knock out his guy, who’s been a great friend for a long time, and obviously, there are dangers with Chisora.
“Yeah, the difficulty is getting the opponent for the right price now. I think with Malik Scott as Deontay Wilder’s trainer and Gerald Washington’s trainer, I think there’s a natural cadence there with that opponent.
“I’ve thought it would be Washington all along, but it’s absolutely not clear at the moment. Who knows? They may even pull the whole event,” said Davies about Joshua’s tune-up event this Saturday.
