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Who and What Is Next for Anthony Joshua?

By Tyler “The Miracle Man” White

As soon as the scorecards were read, the winner was announced and Joshua picked up his shiny, new WBO belt, the very question going through everybody’s minds immediately was – “who’s next?”.

Deontay Wilder – that is who it will most likely be!

This is the man that almost every boxing fan wants to see Anthony Joshua fight next; he’s the man that people believe will really test “AJ’s” chin and his ability to fight under pressure.

As “AJ” has said in a lot of recent interviews and press conferences, he’s in this sport for the business as much as he is the legacy and the discipline that the sport provides; so he’ll do whatever makes the most sense to him, both in terms of money, timing and whatever is necessary to take him closer to achieving his goal of becoming the unified Heavyweight World champion.

What are the options?

There really is only one credible option right now and that is, as stated above, for Joshua to face Wilder.

However, by the looks of things, the Matchroom Boxing promoter Eddie Hearn’s perfect plan is for Dillian Whyte to fight and beat Wilder within the next few months, so that he can set up a rematch between Joshua and Whyte at the end of the year; with all the Heavyweight titles on the line.

Whilst this makes business sense and would be incredibly lucrative in Britain, I cannot see it doing Joshua’s legacy any favors as people genuinely want to see if he can cope with the power and unpredictability of the American Heavyweight.

I also cannot see that Wilder and his team would be willing to risk losing his WBC title in a contest against Whyte. It wouldn’t be worth the risk, with the opportunity to fight Joshua for a lot more money looming and with the opportunity to go down in history as unified heavyweight world champion that would come along with it!

Realistically, “AJ” needs to fight Wilder ASAP before any of the governing bodies make him face a mandatory, otherwise he will either have to vacate a title – ruining his goal of unifying the division – or fight the mandatory opponent and put off the Wilder fight for even longer, with Wilder also having to make a defense in the mean-time.

Fans call for Fury…

After “AJ’s” performance over the weekend and after a lot of people saying that he looked flat, many people have called out for him to face off against Fury, who’s awkward style would undoubtedly cause Joshua more than a few problems!

However, Fury is still getting back into full training and hasn’t fought since the back end of 2015 when he dethroned Wladimir Klitschko; so a fight with Anthony Joshua is still far away and Tyson must get himself back into title contention first!

The former World Champion will need 1 or 2 credible fights to get back into the swing of things after such a lengthy lay off and maybe then we could see “AJ” Vs Fury take place a year or so down the line.

What’s next?

For now, boxing fans are going to have to sit patiently and wait and see what happens. Wilder has supposedly already agreed to take a 40% split in a unification fight with Joshua, but that’s just speculation for now and until the fight has been announced and the contracts signed, we cannot be certain that it’ll be taking place.

If the Joshua Vs Wilder fight for some reason cannot be agreed upon; then we could have a very interesting situation on our hands which could potentially see Joshua fight Povetkin – who is now the WBA mandatory – and we could also see Wilder fight Dillian Whyte, who is the mandatory challenger for the WBC title.

If this unification fight between Wilder and Joshua does not take place; then there’ll certainly be a spanner thrown into the works, which could make the heavyweight scene a bit more exciting and potentially open it up very wide indeed.

For now, I assume that the next big heavyweight fight we’re going to see is the Joshua Vs Wilder unification bout and I’m sure that all of the major governing bodies will be understanding of this as there’s just too much money for them to make, to not get this fight to happen!

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