Sparring partners of Oleksandr Usyk are having to be sent home because they can’t keep up with the Ukrainian.
Usyk defends his WBA, IBF and WBO Heavyweight titles on August 20 in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia against Anthony Joshua.
Although no official undercard announcements have been made Callum Smith v Mathieu Bauderlique, Filip Hrgovic v Zhilei Zhang and Badou Jack v Richard Rivera are rumoured to be part of the event.
Next month’s heavyweight rematch sees the two men collide 11 months on from their fight last September which the new champion won by unanimous decision.
With the rematch just under five weeks away the 35-year-old has been sparring (4-0, 3 KOs) heavyweight Nursultan Amanzholov. And the Kazakh’s manager told Sky Sports of how Usyk has been faring in camp.
“He [Amanzholov] says there are days when Usyk goes to war with him. It’s not easy to hurt to Nursultan but he’s been on the receiving end a few times.”
Usyk Sending Heavyweights Home
“But a lot of his heavyweights have been sent back home, if they can’t stay in camp. They can’t keep up. He says [Usyk] is in tremendous shape for this camp.”
“He said as soon as [Usyk] came back from Jeddah, from the press conference, the day he arrived back, he phoned up Nursultan who was sitting in his hotel and said to him, ‘I want you sparring today.’ Literally got off the plane and started sparring straightaway and [Amanzholov] said he was in a foul mood. He was in a really angry mood, wanted to go to war.”
Usyk-Joshua 2 will be shown live on Sky Sports Box Office in the UK after they surprisingly won the broadcast right ahead of DAZN.