Johnny Nelson has given his breakdown of the potential clash between Anthony Joshua and Deontay Wilder.
At one stage, this was one of the biggest fights to be made in world boxing. Wilder had the United States on lockdown as the WBC champion and was knocking out every man he faced, while Joshua was busy becoming a three-belt unified ruler over in the UK.
Then both men ended up losing, Wilder to Tyson Fury twice, and Joshua to Oleksandr Usyk twice, which rather took the shine off the contest.
Now, Wilder is back to winning ways, having beaten Derek Chisora, and Joshua has only a few options left for big fights.
That said, while speaking to Seconds Out, former cruiserweight world champion Nelson explained why he thinks the fight might not be worth it for Joshua.
“More realistically yes, now, because Deontay Wilder is not the fighter he was. Deontay Wilder is a shot fighter, it’s done to him, but he still might be able to get himself in a position to get himself to a fight with Anthony Joshua.
“Two years ago, three years ago, I’d have thought ‘AJ’, you don’t want to do that, man, now, this version of Wilder is shot, is gone, that trigger is gone, the right hand is gone.
“You’re living on the nostalgic memory of what he used to be so for ‘AJ’, this is a fight for him to lose. Now you’ve got to think to yourself what value is there to Joshua for fighting Wilder. We all know Wilder is shot, it was like two drunks fighting on West Street in Sheffield.
“It was a good fight for the level they were at. All they needed was a couple of beer glasses instead of gloves. So what does ‘AJ’ gain out of that? Why take the risk?”
Joshua is rumoured to be in line to fight Fury later this year but could well have a warm-up first, and that is unlikely to be against someone who still poses the one-punch risk of Wilder.
