Anthony Joshua has been the challenger before, but he has always been the star attraction. This week in Jeddah, he is not only fulfilling the role of underdog as he attempts to regain his WBA, WBO and IBF heavyweight titles from Oleksandr Usyk, but he seems somewhat in the Ukrainian’s shadow.
On his previous trip to Saudi Arabia, in 2019, when Joshua avenged his defeat by Andy Ruiz Jr, Joshua was still very much the centre of attention. The Ruiz loss was seen as a blip, a mistake, a wake-up call.
No one is saying that this week. Usyk is the one calling the tune — literally as he stood up to sing a patriotic anthem in a traditional Cossack costume at yesterday’s press conference. No one is pretending he got lucky when he took away Joshua’s titles last September. Joshua was out-thought, out-fought and outboxed.
Indeed, the question has been raised about whether the 32-year-old might even retire should he lose. The large team around Joshua have pushed back at any suggestion he would walk away and after yesterday’s head-to-head, Joshua made that point again.
“I’m not thinking about retirement,” he said. “I’ve got one of the biggest fights of my life coming up and if you were thinking about retiring, it would be a massive doubt in your mind. People will always ask questions. Me, I still want to continue. I love it.
“I’m competing with pound-for-pound fighters. If I was losing to some has-been, then, yes.
“But it’s crazy to talk about retiring when I lost to one of the best fighters in the world. What sort of nonsense is that? I respect people’s opinions, but I don’t want to retire.”
The barriers are up around the Joshua camp, with some pushing back at a perceived pro-Usyk sentiment among the Sky Sports team. Any such accusations are completely unfair, but a siege mentality is playing out. This is Team Joshua against the world.
Being the underdog could suit Joshua well. Not only are expectations more limited, but he is not forced to sell the show on his own, which gives him more time to concentrate on the job at hand.
Usyk, meanwhile, knows he has a nation behind him. His brutal training regime has turned him into “a cyborg”, according to Alexander Krassyuk, his promoter. He has endured such feats of endurance as 100km cycling rides in 45C heat and five-hour swims.
Usyk exudes a great, natural confidence. Having become undisputed world champion at cruiserweight, he has his eyes on becoming the same at heavyweight by beating Tyson Fury, the WBC champion, after Joshua.
The rematch with Joshua was written into the contract of the first fight, but Usyk made no attempt to get out of it, the return was a fight he wanted. And having had Joshua clinging on in the 12th round at the end of their first meeting, he expects to pick up where he left off.
“I don’t think it’s going to be a new bout,” Usyk said. “The last bout will be continued, round 13, round 14, round 15, however long the fight will last.
“We learnt about each other in the first fight. He learnt about me and I learnt about him. We have had enough time to study each other and on Saturday it will be a great fight.”
