Anthony Joshua may delay his bid to avenge his loss to IBF heavyweight champion Daniel Dubois by facing Tyson Fury in the first half of 2025.
Promoter Eddie Hearn says he doesn’t want to make the rematch for AJ vs. Dubois right now because there is a possibility Fury could defeat unified champion Oleksandr Usyk in their December 21 rematch.
Hearn says that if Fury wins that fight, he wouldn’t want Joshua to have already signed up for a rematch with Dubois when he could face Tyson in May “for the biggest fight in boxing.
The 36-year-old Fury is the underdog against Usyk, and unless he can find the Fountain of Youth and drinking heavily from the rejuvenating waters, he will likely be blown away by the talent in their rematch. Fury needs his youth to be restored to his 2015 form as when he achieved his career best win he beat Wladimir Klitschko.
The last two fights for Gyspy King have shown that he has aged poorly, and he is unable to win the second fight against Usyk or beat any of the killers in the top five. Even upstart Francis Ngannou beat Fury to the punch, but was handed a controversial 10-round loss last year in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia on October 28. As Fury did against Usyk earlier this year on May 18, he won’t last long in their rematch.
Fury is likely to be destroyed by Usyk on December 21, making a fight between him and Joshua a joke for May 2025, when Hearn is gunning for the money grab fit.
“AJ wants revenge, but the only issue is timing. For the rematch to take place in February, training camp will have to start in a few weeks,” said Eddie Hearn. BBC Sports on why Anthony Joshua will not take the rematch with Daniel Dubois.
“There’s always niggles, and he’s had a few, so physically it’s just a case of whether AJ is ready to do it. It will be frustrating if we make the Dubois rematch and Fury wins (the Usyk rematch). Then we sit there and say, ‘Wait a minute, we’re fighting Dubois, but we could have fought Fury in May for the biggest fight in boxing.’
The underlying message is that Hearn has no confidence that Joshua can win the rematch against Dubois. So, he’d rather match AJ against Fury to grab the spoils instead of putting him back in with the shark Dubois and watching him get torn apart again.
