Anthony Joshua ‘declining’ since 2017 in brutal assessment ahead of Oleksandr Usyk rematch

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Dmitriy Salita has declared that Anthony Joshua has been on the decline since his April 2017 victory over Wladimir Klitschko. The Ukrainian professional boxer turned promoter doesn’t see a way ‘AJ’ can beat Oleksandr Usyk on August 20 and believes his best days are behind him.

Joshua was comfortably outpointed by Usyk last September at the Tottenham Hotspur Stadium in London as he dropped his WBA (super), IBF, and WBO world heavyweight titles. Now, the Watford powerhouse will have a chance to avenge his loss as he rematches his adversary later this month at the King Abdullah Sport City Stadium in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia.

Coming into the bout, the consensus opinion is that Joshua must adopt a more aggressive approach to the second contest and use his size and strength advantage to good use. Many believe that he will be in with a shot of winning providing he implements roughhouse tactics into his game plan. However, Salita is confident that Usyk’s understanding of the sweet science will be too much for Joshua.

“Usyk is the better fighter, and I just don’t see how AJ can make the adjustments to beat Usyk, I don’t see it,” Salita told BoyleSports Boxing. 

“Usyk is a very experienced fighter, had a tremendous amateur career, and is an Olympic gold medalist. He has been taught the science of boxing as a kid and really knows boxing like a scientist, on a scientific level. He’s a boxing master, one of the most educated boxers in the world, maybe even of all time. He’s really, really well educated in terms of the sweet science.  

“This isn’t to take anything away from AJ, he’s a great fighter and did some amazing things in his career, but when he beat Klitschko that was the peak of his career.  And after that, he’s been progressively slipping down just a little bit every fight.

“AJ is athletically very gifted and a hard worker and did the best he can with what he’s got. But I believe that skill-wise and boxing knowledge wise these are two different athletes. The only thing that AJ has in his favour is we don’t know how what’s going on in Ukraine affected Usyk. Has it inspired and motivated him, or is it causing him trouble and emotional turmoil? No one really knows.”

Since losing to Usyk last year, Joshua axed long-time trainer Rob McCracken and enlisted the services of legendary trainer Robert Garcia who is working alongside former assistant coach Angel Fernandez in preparations. According to Garcia, Joshua is adjusting to the new training methods well and has become far more spiteful in the process – something that can only be of benefit to ‘AJ’ on fight night.

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