Former cruiserweight and heavyweight world champion, David Haye, has offered some advice to his countryman, Anthony Joshua, ahead of a proposed fight with Deontay Wilder.
Joshua and Wilder have been linked with a fight for years now, and although there will be no title on the line as things currently stand, it is arguably still the biggest fight in the heavyweight division.
Despite struggles in the past, a quiet confidence has recently emerged that the bout will be made, with both men in talks for a clash in Saudi Arabia by the end of 2023.
Upon hearing the rumours, Haye told Seconds Out that Joshua’s best chance of defeating ‘The Bronze Bomber’ is to become the aggressor and to put the American onto the back foot, but admitted that this has not been one of Joshua’s strengths in his recent outings.
“It is a shootout. It’s whoever puts it on the most, that is who will win the fight. We know Wilder isn’t afraid to let his hands go, that is for sure. Last time out, ‘AJ’ was too tentative, he did enough to win the fight against Franklin, but that was it, he did enough.”
“I was really underwhelmed with that last performance [against Franklin]. I thought that was the perfect opportunity to show the world ‘I am back, look what I am doing to with this guy, who went twelve rounds with Dillian Whyte and I have just chewed him up in three rounds’. That would have been a statement, but it wasn’t a statement.”
Haye said that there was success to be had against Wilder, but he wasn’t sure if ‘AJ’ had it in him in his current form.
“The people who have had the most success with Wilder have been [Luis] Ortiz and [Tyson] Fury. They both brought the fight to him, to beat Wilder you have got to get in range and get busy. Currently, ‘AJ’ hasn’t been getting busy.”
Fans are hopeful that Joshua-Wilder could appear on the same night as an undisputed bout between Fury and Oleksandr Usyk, as talks for a mammoth night of boxing in the Middle East continue.