ANTHONY JOSHUA has something to prove against Dominic Breazeale on Saturday (June 25) at the O2. It will be Joshua’s first defence of the IBF heavyweight title but he wants to demonstrate that he’s more than solely a knockout puncher.
“I would love to go in there and just move around the ring and not get hit without even having to throw any punches. We’ve shown the power but I’ve never shown footwork. It would be nice for me to be confident enough to say I’m going to take a round off and display some footwork. But if not I might go in there with the instinct just to try and outbox him but land a shot that will punish him early on,” he said. “It depends how I approach the fight. You’ve seen how I approached the Dillian Whyte fight, you see how I approached the Charles Martin fight, it’s how I approach the fight.
“The bell goes and you go into your own zone. I display it in sparring because there’s no pressure, which is always good I practise things in sparring, but in the ring I just wait for that one chance to punish someone, I don’t really display anything special except for punching power and knockout punches… If they ever get hurt, I think that if I don’t get them out now that could be me in six, seven rounds, so I don’t like to go easy on them once I’ve got them hurt, I like to get them out because the tables can always turn in a 12 round fight. If I do see an opportunity, I have to take it.”
But he suggests this fight against Breazeale might be the one where he shows more of his qualities as a boxer. “Someone bigger will have me having to slip because if I just walk forward I’m going to take four before I land one. So you do have to do a bit of movement, rolling, a bit of inside work so hopefully I can display that but it’s all about confidence and mindset. Controlling a fight, it’s at that stage now where I should be able to control a fight,” he promises.
