After Anthony Joshua’s crushing defeat to Daniel Dubois, there were some people within the sport calling for him to retire. Not least of these was ‘The Hitman’ Ricky Hatton.
Now after some time since the fight, Hatton has clarified what he meant.
Ricky Hatton is one of the greatest fighters to come out of Britain and he brought his country’s fans some of their greatest nights.
His biggest night came in 2005 when he won the IBO world super lightweight title, in his hometown, Manchester, against Kostya Tszyu.
He also shared the ring with two of the best boxers in the history of the sport, in Manny Pacquiao and Floyd Mayweather.
With a record of 45-3, he retired in 2012 after being knocked out by Vyacheslav Senchenko.
His son, Campbell, has followed in his footsteps, but after back-to-back defeats, it does not seem likely that he will reach the feats of his father.
Speaking to IFL TV, Ricky Hatton has clarified his comments after Joshua’s defeat.
“I think I speak for the whole nation, I’ve got a lot of love for Anthony Joshua.”
”The thing is about boxing is, you don’t like seeing your mates get knocked out.”
”I don’t think he’s got anything left to prove.”
Hatton points out that ‘AJ’ has nothing else left to prove in the sport, but whether he carries on or not should be up to him.
He then went on to suggest who he would like to see Joshua fight if he were to carry on.
”But if he wants to carry on, who wouldn’t want to see him fight Tyson Fury.”
Hatton also suggested that if he were Daniel Dubois he would be annoyed about a potential rematch and instead should be looking at different options.
”Daniel Dubois deserves the chance to rematch Usyk or the big payday with Tyson”
This week we learnt that the rematch may not even take place next as Anthony Joshua is unlikely to be ready for a proposed February 22nd date.
Instead, there have been rumours of potential replacements for Dubois, with a certain Zhilei Zhang through in his name into the hat.
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