Eddie Hearn says the plan is for Anthony Joshua to battle #1 Filip Hrgovic for the vacant IBF heavyweight world title in the summer after his clash against former UFC champion Francis Ngannou on March 8th in Saudi Arabia.
Speaking with Ariel Helwani’s site, Hearn laid out the plan for Joshua to fight for the IBF strap [if it becomes vacant] in the summer.
Hearn assumes that Joshua (27-3, 24 KOs) will defeat Ngannou (0-1), who is winless and a little more than a simple hard-punching novice with excellent standup grappling skills.
What would be hilarious is if Ngannou wins, and he’s the one who faces Ngannou for the IBF belt. Talk about making a mockery of the sport.
Mocking The Game?
That would just make a pure joke of it, and Hearn would be viewed as the creator of this spectacle by choosing to match Joshua against Ngannou in the first place rather than having AJ face a serious opponent in March, like Hrgovic for the IBF belt.
Joshua covets the IBF belt, wanting it to validate his slow climb back to the top after being unceremoniously knocked off his perch by Andy Ruiz Jr. in 2019 and then booted once again by Oleksandr Usyk.
Undependable AJ
Given AJ’s history of failure when Hearn has talked up a future big fight for him, it would be better if Eddie kept his trap shut and let things play out with his clash against Ngannou before he started flapping his gums about the Hrgovic matchup. Joshua is just too undependable.
Hearn’s grand plan could go up in smoke if the winner of the Tyson Fury vs. Oleksandr Usyk fight on February 17th chooses to keep the IBF title and the International Boxing Federation allows them to do that until after their rematch.
Eddie would then need to decide what to do with Joshua for his summer fight, assuming he beats Ngannou. Does Hearn go looking for another stiff like the ones he’d matched him in consecutive fights since his loss to Usyk, or does he throw him in with Hrgovic anyway despite the IBF title not being available?
It would look really bad if Hearn matches Joshua against another Otto Wallin-esque level heavyweight instead of a top-tier talent like Zhilei Zhang, who wants to take AJ’s head off.