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Out goes Deontay Wilder, in comes Francis Ngannou.
On Friday, well-regarded combat sports reporter Ariel Helwani relayed that two-time former boxing heavyweight champion Anthony Joshua had signed an agreement to fight the Cameroonian former UFC heavyweight champion in a 10-round bout in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia.
The fight will take place on March 8.
Ngannou is currently listed as the 10th-ranked heavyweight in the World Boxing Council (WBC) rankings after losing a close decision in his debut boxing match to linear champion Tyson Fury in November. The 36-year-old actually scored a knockdown on Fury but was outpointed on the judges’ scorecards, with many fans claiming that he really won against a champion who didn’t take the fight seriously.
ESPN’s Mike Coppinger theorized that Turki Alalshikh, the chair of Saudi Arabia’s entertainment authority, believes that Ngannou presents “perhaps an even more intriguing matchup for Joshua” compared to Wilder.
There could be some truth to that theory, especially after Wilder’s stunning loss to heavyweight contender Joseph Parker in December. That a fight with Ngannou was made so quickly shouldn’t be much of a surprise. Wilder, like Joshua, was an undefeated champion whose incredible power seemed to make up for his widely criticized style of boxing. After ending up on the worse end of a trilogy with Fury in which he lost the WBC title, a big fight with Joshua finally seemed possible after both men had lost their luster in recent years.
Joshua’s performance against Otto Wallin in the same card that Wilder lost on back in December was a feather in the cap for the Briton in 2023. After dropping his shares of the heavyweight crown to Oleksander Usyk in 2021 and losing the rematch, he was more active in the last calendar year than he had been in some time, with three straight wins.
There’s plenty to be said for this being just a 10-round fight. If Ngannou – who still plans to get in an MMA cage soon – is truly a contender as his surprising ranking suggests, then why not have him fight 12 rounds as all other boxers at this level must do?
Regardless, there’s no question that there’s a major purse to be had, especially considering that the Saudis are once again hosting a big boxing event – and perhaps a chance to be in the mix after Fury and Usyk do battle for the undisputed title later this year.
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