Anthony Joshua lined up for ‘absolutely colossal’ fight against Fury or Usyk with Deontay Wilder blockbuster ‘DEAD’
ANTHONY JOSHUA is being lined up with an “absolutely colossal” fight as an alternative to Deontay Wilder.
AJ was set for a March 9 blockbuster against Wilder until the American blew the £100million deal by losing to Joseph Parker.
So now Joshua has to turn his attention elsewhere and Eddie Hearn wants him to fight the winner between Tyson Fury and Oleksandr Usyk.
But the promoter also named Filip Hrgovic, Zhilei Zhang and Francis Ngannou as other options.
It was ex-UFC champion Ngannou who floored Fury on his boxing debut only to controversially lose on points.
Hearn told iFL TV: “Right now, we have three fights that we’re in discussions for.
“They’re all big and that doesn’t involve Deontay Wilder for March. Our aim, and they’ve expressed this is to fight the winner of Fury-Usyk.
“That’s all we want to do, obviously there’s the Hrgovic fight out there for the world heavyweight title.
“There’s a Francis Ngannou fight out there which would be absolutely colossal.
“There’s other heavyweights as well, there’s a Zhang fight possible as well with Queensberry.”
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Fury, 35, and Usyk, 36, are believed to have signed a two-fight deal that could produce a rematch between the pair.
And it would likely mean the winner would lose the IBF title for being unable to face mandatory challenger Hrgovic, 31.
So Joshua and Hearn are looking to capitalise by facing the Croatian for what would be a vacant title.
And Zhang, 40, is riding high off consecutive stoppage wins over Joe Joyce, 38.
But Ngannou, 37, is likely to be the most lucrative option even though he comes without a world title.