Anthony Joshua: The Final Hurdle?

Anthony Joshua: The Final Hurdle?

In many ways, Anthony Joshua will hope he can clear the last hurdle in his path tonight in Jeddah when he fights Kristian Prenga.

Tyson Fury, looking more like Chuck Gardner with each passing day, laboured to a predictable victory over the 46-year-old Mariusz Wach in Thailand last night. Fury and the money men will hope another no-hoper doesn’t put the final nail into the proposed showdown with Anthony Joshua, which is expected to take place later this year.

Despite Fury being his usual tiresome self and putting doubt into that lucrative all-British heavyweight blockbuster, if Joshua does, as expected, blows away Prenga, they are almost certainly to be finally sharing a ring together in the coming months. There is far too much money on the table for it to fail now. But don’t get me started on the when and the where. A long-awaited fight between two British heavyweights that will likely take place on away soil in the early hours for UK fans. Madness. A rant for another day.

But before all that, Joshua just has to do his bit to seal the deal. There seems little doubt or jeopardy in his fight against the unfancied 35-year-old Albanian heavyweight. Prenga (20-1) has the numbers on paper. All his wins have come inside the distance. Look a little deeper, you see why. A points defeat in 2017 to Giovanni Auriemma hardly inspires confidence. Prenga has been picked for a reason. To lose.

But that safety-first attitude can be excused. We all know what Joshua had to endure last year in Nigeria in that horrific car crash that killed two close friends. Joshua needed time before any thoughts of picking up what was left of his boxing career. The two-time world heavyweight champion decided he had more to give. But he needed a tune-up fight before any thoughts of that $100m showdown with his great British rival. You can’t blame Joshua for that.

Joshua (29-4) will have demons to conquer. Both physical and mental. He could have walked away. Nobody would have blamed him if he had. But Joshua wants to give it one last go. Boxing will be a distraction from his thoughts. But at 36, the former Olympic champion knows the clock is very much ticking.

“He’s a very good fighter,” Joshua said of Prenga this week. “Very dangerous fighter.” Joshua is being kind. He’s just doing his job in selling the fight.

A fight between Fury and Joshua doesn’t need too much selling, some might say. But Fury’s glorified sparring session with Wach wasn’t televised, and Joshua-Prenga, somewhat predictably, is on PPV. Restricted eyes on your product is never good business. Boxing is a strange world at times. Sheer greed or short-sighted. Decide amongst yourselves. Let people see your product.

There should be no surprises tonight even though Joshua is a faded fighter. In truth, he has been for some time. He looked poor in stopping Jake Paul last time out. The 6th-round stoppage of Paul came off the back of that brutal stoppage defeat at the hands of Daniel Dubois in 2024. You can understand why the Prenga fight is needed. Confidence will be fragile and has been for a number of years.

Joshua has been on the road trying to find what his mind needs. A series of different trainers over the last few years is a worrying trend. Now in the Oleksandr Usyk camp, Joshua has lost some of those natural instincts. He thinks too much. Like a golfer who messes around with his swing looking for perfection. It becomes too mechanical. Joshua has been guilty of that ever since that devastating setback against Andy Ruiz. Maybe being aligned with Usyk is what he needs. Maybe it’s just too late.

We won’t find out too much tonight. Prenga will do his job. He will offer some resistance before Joshua gets him out of there.

A fight between Fury and Joshua has lost much of its shine. And importance. Missed opportunities when it actually meant something. But it will still sell much in the same way Amir Khan and Kell Brook did. There is still money to be made. Probably more than ever. It will attract the ever-so-crucial casual market. They won’t care too much that it’s a fight between two badly faded fighters. We still care, just not as much as we once did.

But we are not quite there yet. One last hurdle. And one that Anthony Joshua will clear with the minimum amount of fuss.