Eddie Hearn says Anthony Joshua will fight in May or June and start training camp in January. By then, the former two-time heavyweight champion (28-4, 25 KOs) will have had four months of rest to recuperate from his fifth-round knockout loss to IBF champion Daniel Dubois on September 21st.
Joshua Eyes May/June Bout
Hearn states that Joshua, 35, will fight twice in 2025, which he hopes will be against Tyson Fury for two bouts. If not him, a rematch with Dubois (22-2, 21 KOs). AJ still wants to avenge his loss, but first on the agenda is Fury if he doesn’t retire.
Understandably, Hearn is pushing hard to hurry up and make the Joshua vs. Fury fight because both fighters have aged and can no longer be counted on to defeat the tier competition. If Hearn were to wait, both guys would continue to get beaten by the younger or even the older heavyweights.
While they can both still defeat many of the top 15 guys, there are more than a handful of heavyweights in the division that would have an excellent chance of defeating them.
Hearn says Joshua-Fury and Chris Eubank Jr. vs. Conor Benn are the two biggest fights in British boxing. He could be right. Fans want to see both of those contests, even if the rest of the world doesn’t.
“In May or June. He’s not in full training yet. He’s probably ready to resume training in January,” said Eddie Hearn to iFL TV about when Anthony Joshua will fight next. “At the moment, you’ve got the Dubois fight [against Joseph Parker] on February 22nd, and you’ve got to see what Fury wants to do.
“We’re not in a terrible rush. AJ will fight twice in 2025. Once in the summer and once in the winter. If we can’t make the Dubois fight and if Fury don’t want to fight, then you have to make the decision to fight somebody, or do you wait for those fights?
“I can’t speak on behalf of AJ, for who he’s prepared to fight, but what I know is the focus is Daniel Dubois or Tyson Fury. Of course, he’s [Joshua] done it all. If he gets Fury on his resume, he’s boxed virtually everybody of his era.
AJ vs. Fury in 2025?
Fury still hasn’t said whether he’ll fight Joshua. He was pretty upset after his 12-round unanimous decision loss to unified heavyweight champion Oleksandr Usyk in their rematch on December 21st in Riyadh. He believed he’d won the fight by three rounds and seemed bitter at the post-fight press conference, complaining about his second defeat against Usyk.
As upset as Fury is, the money he can get for a fight against Joshua will lure him back into the ring. He won’t sulk for too long when $100 million is waved beneath his snoot by Turki Al-Shiekh for the AJ clash.
“It’s [Fury] a tough fight, it’s a 50-50 fight, but run it twice and see where we are at the end of it. The two biggest fights in British boxing, Eubank-Benn and Fury-AJ, by a mile. Nothing even comes close,” said Hearn.
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