Joe Joyce has insisted he is not yet done with boxing and has set himself an ambitious target for his return.
British heavyweight Joyce enjoyed a successful amateur career that ended with him winning a silver medal at the 2016 Rio Olympics.
After turning professional in 2017, he quickly rose through the heavyweight ranks and got some big wins under his belt, not least when he beat Daniel Dubois in November 2020 to claim the British, Commonwealth and European heavyweight titles.
He battered Dubois into submission that night after inflicting so much damage on the younger fighter’s eye socket that ‘DDD’ decided to take a knee and allow himself to be counted out.
Joyce went on to beat Joseph Parker and Carlos Takam but twice lost to Zhilei Zhang by KO and has since also taken points defeats to Derek Chisora and Filip Hrgovic.
He has now told Sky Sports Boxing that he wants a rematch with WBO champion Dubois.
“It’s always an attractive option. Before I took Zhang, which was obviously a bad decision, I was WBO Interim [champion] off the back of beating Dubois and Parker. So it’s just like a bit of a mistake that I’m going to rectify now.”
Joyce is now 40 and has not fought since April of last year, but his latest return stars with a fight against unbeaten opponent Artem Suslenkov on the Murat Gassiev vs Tony Yoka undercard in Moscow on July 11, while Dubois could well be tied up with a rematch with Fabio Wardley, who he defeated in his last contest back in April.
