Here’s Donald McRae’s report from Wembley. Thank you for reading our fight night coverage.
Joshua, climbing the steps of the arena, sees a bill poster for the fight, and throws a punch at the face of Pulev. What was said in the ring afterwards? It will surely be revealed at some point. All had seemed amicable.
Here’s where the chicanery really begins. Heavyweight boxing negotiations on a par with trying to get a sweetheart, cake-and-eat-it deal out of the EU. The difference being, of course, that both parties can make themselves richer.
2️⃣0️⃣2️⃣1️⃣
— Matchroom Boxing (@MatchroomBoxing) December 12, 2020
Tyson Fury* where you at?! #RoadToUndisputed #JoshuaPulev
* We can't tag as we're still blocked 🙃 pic.twitter.com/mvKEjU1lPE
Frank has spoken.
Well done AJ looking forward to the AJ V Tyson fight jealous? No I have had my time. As a boxing fan can't wait good night for British boxing pic.twitter.com/0bAnb6kShS
— Frank Bruno MBE 🇬🇧 (@frankbrunoboxer) December 12, 2020
Eddie Hearn speaks.
Since he came into the office he’s wanted to be undisputed heavyweight champion of the world. We know what we have to do, starting from tomorrow; we make the Tyson Fury fight. It’s the only fight to be made in boxing. It’s the biggest fight in British boxing history. I promise you, he wants it. He’s the best heavyweight in the world. Less talk, more action. Let’s get it done.
Anthony Joshua speaks.
Wembley Arena, can you hear me. Let’s make some noise. One thousand fans, I love you all. Boxing is about less talk and more actions and I hope everyone was satisfied.
For me, I stuck to what I know best. The boxing. I don’t really want to do an interview. Go and have a lovely Christmas and we’ll see you in 2021. You ask the crowd what they want to see.
(The crowd say they want Tyson Fury.)
Last year, 2019. I want to challenge. It’s not about the opponent. It’s about the legacy and the belt. If that’s Tyson Fury, let it be Tyson Fury. It’s no big deal.
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David Diamante does his business on the mic and announces that Joshua has retained his belts via a ninth-round KO. Joshua and AJ are chatting away still like they are the best of friends. Or so it looked for a while, as Joshua looks peeved and Pulev has a conspiratorial grin on his face. Some words exchanged? Joshua departs with a wave of his white glove.
Next stop? Joshua v Tyson Fury.
Pulev takes the applause, and some rather unnecessary boos. The crowd is very rowdy. Then the two boxers share a moment together, which takes the form of them performing very aggressive high fives in boxing gloves.
Pulev’s bravery was not sustainable, especially when those type of shots were coming in. AJ shares a manly moment with Floyd Mayweather. That was his 22nd knockout. It was the uppercut that did the damage. Joshua showed off his variety of skills and that he still packs a serious punch. The right hand ended it.
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Joshua knocks out Pulev in the ninth!
Round 9
Joshua again begins with those left-hand jabs, and Pulev tries to get inside. He can only do so with a clinch. Pulev looks remarkably unmarked despite the shots he has taken. Joshua misses with a huge uppercut that might have got the job done. Then comes another uppercut. Pulev hangs on for dear life, while still smiling. He sure can take a punch. But then comes two mighty uppercuts that surely finish him. He’s down, but gets up after an eight count. The first punch that follows clubs Pulev to the ground. He won’t be getting back up.
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Round 8
Joshua tries to keep Pulev on the end of a jab. But Pulev lands a sweet right. AJ goes back in and is aggressive with a nice combination, and Joshua goes again for the body. Pulev is a tough nut to crack, make no mistake. The clinches are becoming more prevalent. This is not an easy night for Joshua, who is showing off a mix of his skills. He is ahead on points but a KO is looking less likely. The jab is keeping Pulev at bay and he looks tired.
Our scorecard: Joshua 78-73 Pulev.
Round 7
Joshua lopes out for the seventh, and launches a series of left-hand jabs. He takes up the aggressor’s role, and lands an uppercut when they get close in. Pulev tries a long-range right that Joshua sees. Another uppercut comes in. Then comes a barrage of combinations. Pulev laughing again as he counters. Joshua steps off the gas a little and ends up on the end of a jab and a rare 1-2 from Pulev.
Our scorecard: Joshua 68-64 Pulev
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Round 6
Joshua skips away from Pulev’s attempts to take up the initiative. There’s a clinch, and Pulev is trying his best with his right hand. It’s all something of a grapple, and that suits Pulev. He is trying to go for the back of the head, and the referee has noticed that. Pulev is bulldozing on but Joshua is still moving well.
Our scorecard: Joshua 58-55 Pulev
Round 5
Pulev aggressive now. Joshua a little more circumspect. He throws a couple of jabs but seems to have waylaid his previous fluency. Pulev’s defensive quality showing up, and he is using the body punches, as proved successful for Ruiz. Joshua though, with another of those right crosses, has Pulev rocked. But he comes back again, and finishes the round on the front foot.
Our scorecard: Joshua 48-45 Pulev
Round 4
What can Joshua do now? Pulev looks pretty damned robust considering the punishment he has just taken but AJ looks for the combinations that caused such problems in the third. Pulev launches a bomb. He’s already in the position where a knockout may be required. Has a flat spot been hit? Pulev seems to have cleared his head. There’s a clinch and Pulev tries some body shots. Pulev launches a couple over the top without really connecting. Better from the Bulgarian. He looked gone in the third but fought back well.
Our scorecard: Joshua 39-35 Pulev.
Updated
Round 3
Pulev goes on the attack but Joshua ducks under a jab, as the Bulgarian tries to gain control of the centre of the ring. There’s a clinch and a clubbing right from Pulev. Joshua catches Pulev with a right cross, and Pulev is shaken. He smiles again but he is wobbling. Then Pulev goes to the corner, and as Joshua unleashes a dizzying combination a standing count is called. They resume and Pulev is swiftly down, and wobbling. He gets up at eight and hangs on until the end. There are shots after the bell from Pulev who was lucky to survive the round.
Our scorecard: Joshua 30-25 Pulev.
Updated
Round 2
That long left jab of Joshua’s being launched at both Pulev’s head and body. A minute in, he lands a good one on Pulev. Then a decent combination reaches its target. Pulev smiles, but that may be gamesmanship. Pulev counters but his punches are a little telegraphed. Joshua looks lean, and he lands a decent body shot towards the end of the round.
Our scorecard: Joshua 20-18 Pulev
Updated
Round 1
Here we go. The two tap gloves and the game is afoot. It’s cagey, with Joshua starting with a body shot. Both have their guards up with Joshua’s left serving as both defensive tool and attacking weapon. They exchange jabs. Joshua lands one through the Pulev defence. A lot of feinting going on. Nice left from Pulev but he’s knocked back by a Joshua jab. A quiet opener, with maybe AJ ahead.
Our scorecard: 10-9 to Joshua.
Pulev the Cobra gets the boos. That was always likely to happen. AJ bows to all four corners of the arena, as DD reads out his record of 24 fights and 23 wins, making sure to remind that his one defeat was instantly avenged. “Watford, England” sounds more exotic and tough than it actually is.
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David Diamante gives it the spiel of sponsors and associated organisations and suits, of which there are many, as he builds up to the fight. The judges are from England, Bulgaria and Italy, the referee is from South Africa. “This is it, the time has come,” bellows DD. “THE FIGHT STARTS NOW.”
Here’s AJ’s ring walk, which is made to the accompaniment of Chris de Burgh’s A Spaceman Came Travelling a rap tune dedicated to him. Then, Joshua appears on the big screen in a pre-record and asks the crowd to pray for him. Next comes Seven Nation Army, and some monochrome imagery. Finally comes Survivor’s Burning Heart, the hipster’s choice of boxing anthem as Joshua, clad in white, saunters to the ring.
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Pulev is making his way to the ring, with Blur’s Song 2 playing loud as he gets ready to make his entrance. David Diamante, ponytailed dreads resplendent, is the man on the mic. Pulev’s music has a Bulgarian, Euro new age edge to it. He looks cool as a cucumber as he arrives in the ring. No boos for him, which makes a nice change.
There are 1,000 fans at Wembley, and yet still, and possibly defying Covid regs, they are all belting out Neil Diamond’s Sweet Caroline. There are beers being supped and bald-headed, portly gentlemen swaying away. Social distancing in short supply, perhaps.
Floyd Mayweather is in the house, and calls Anthony Joshua a “hell of a fighter and a gentleman”. What function he is fulfilling by being in London is not made clear though he is fighting that lad off YouTube in February. Floyd, fully masked up, has a rather fetching and no doubt ridiculously expensive flecked jacket on.
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Does Pulev bears any resemblance to Ruiz, who stopped Joshua’s career in its tracks?
Comparing Pulev and Ruiz before heading into their fights vs. AJ. 📊 pic.twitter.com/0y3E5Vfeg2
— DAZN Boxing (@DAZNBoxing) December 10, 2020
That rather truncated fight means we are now not far away from the main event. Okolie, for his part, says his mate AJ will get the job done quickly.
🎞🤛🏾 pic.twitter.com/QBthYC8idm
— Anthony Joshua (@anthonyfjoshua) December 12, 2020
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First sight of the showman’s gush from Eddie Hearn as he praises Lawrence Okolie.
Well done to Lawrence for staying focused. The hardest puncher in the cruiserweight division. He will knock out he whole division before going up to heavyweight.
Lawrence Okolie speaks.
I had to put on a good performance to secure a world title fight next year. Eddie [Hearn] said I had to supply a knockout and I said ‘no problem. Shane [McGuigan] at the moment has got me punching hard. This is the way I am going to be fighting from now on.
Lawrence Okolie is the new International Cruiserweight champion, and thankfully Nikodem Jezewski is up and talking. There is an exchange of embraces, and that’s the Londoner’s night’s work competed. Tougher opponents await.
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The second round produces an inevitable result: Lawrence Okolie fells Nikodem Jezewski, with a straight right hand that puts his opponent down. Shane McGuigan, Okolie’s coach, enjoyed that one. That world title cannot be far off. Worryingly, Jezewski is taking on oxygen. His unbeaten record did not last six minutes in London. The referee stopped the fight in the second round when in truth it might have been stopped in the first.
Okolie lands a quick blow, and Jezewski is down on his knees in second. The Englishman has the Pole down again, and his legs are jelly. Real power punching but somehow Jezewski manages to survive the round. Okolie was supposed to be fighting for a world title before Covid intervened for his intended opponent. And he’s looked world class so far.
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Lawrence Okolie vs Nikodem Jezewski is the fight before the big one. Hackney’s Okolie is a protege of Joshua, and he enters the ring in exceptionally casual style, and to a rap he performed himself, including a passage on visiting Dubai that does not bear repeating. This is an international cruiserweight bout. Both of these fighters are undefeated.
Looks like Joshua is getting strapped in for the big fight. The shots of Pulev shows the challenger looking very relaxed indeed.
👀 🎯 #JoshuaPulev @SkySportsBoxing @DAZNBoxing pic.twitter.com/Gv2Pcq2yFp
— Eddie Hearn (@EddieHearn) December 12, 2020
In the tenth round, Fury, knowing victory is all but his barring a successful Hail Mary from Wach, steps it up and launches a few more aggressive punches. No knockout comes in the end, but victory is assured long before the judges’ decision is made. Considering that cut, Fury fought bravely and well. Perhaps the best of his career so far. He wins by unanimous decision.
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The cuts man who sorted Hughie Fury’s cut used to work on Ricky Hatton’s very splittable face, and he’s done a grand job. No loss of vision and Wach is the one seeing stars as they enter the ninth round.
That’s a nasty cut Hughie Fury has there! What I will guarantee though is the only person stopping Hughie Fury is a Doctor! Immense bravery and a good cut man in Kerry Kayes! 👌👊👌
— Tony Bellew (@TonyBellew) December 12, 2020
Pulev, meanwhile, looks relaxed as he talks to Sky.
I feel great, because now is the important moment. I feel full of energy and ready to rumble. I’m here now, and ready. Very hungry.
Wach’s pinned back by Fury’s superior boxing technique, and the Mancunian looks odds-on to take the fight on points. He is dominating.
The fifth round sees Fury slowing down a tad. Plenty of grappling between him and Wach. Fury’s eye looks as if it will be OK for the moment; the doctor agrees, in fact, ahead of the sixth. If the fight is stopped because of the cut, it will go to points as it was an accidental clash. Peter Fury urges on his boy to be more aggressive and he responds with his best round of the bout so far.
“Unleash the Fury!” shouts out someone in the crowd ahead of the fourth round. Covid-19 has made this event, which would surely be staged next door at Wembley Stadium, into something like a Saturday night tear-up down down Bethnal Green’s York Hall. As if to respond to that, Hughie Fury launches a couple of bombs that have his Polish opponent pinned back on the ropes. But there is a cut over the Englishman’s eye, and he looks to get the fight finished quickly so that doesn’t cause him to be stopped. The doctor has a look at the cut. It’s a bad one, but he’s allowed to go on. It happened after a clash of heads. His cuts man has a reconstruction job on his hands.
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The small crowd allowed into Wembley gets behind Fury, who takes one hell of a hit from Wach but remains the greater aggressor in the opening couple of rounds.
No Tyson Fury seen as yet tonight. Instead, Hughie Fury, his 26-year-old cousin, is fighting Mariusz Wach, the 40-year-old, 20-stone Polish veteran from Krakow. Fury Minor (removed) enters the ring to the sound of Hot Chocolate’s You Sexy Thing. Peter Fury, uncle of Tyson, is Hughie’s trainer.
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Anthony Joshua speaks to Sky.
It’s been tough, but nothing like the real thing. I’m looking forward to fighting. I’ve done hundreds of rounds of sparring which is the closest thing to the fight. I’m happy with what we’ve done so far.
It’s a good fight, definitely. I was ready to fight him two years ago. We took the challenge and so I am looking forward to taking him on. All of them are good. It’s up to me to dispose of their strengths and make them weaknesses. I ain’t putting pressure on myself, bro. All I am doing is going in there and making it a good performance and that will lead to destruction and that will lead to the win.
Martin Bakole vs Sergey Kuzmin, a heavyweight bout for the WBC International title, is the undercard fight just finished. Bakole, a Congolese fighter, holds the chunky Russian at bay to win a ten-round fight on a unanimous points verdict. The two fighters are all smiles at the end and Bakole celebrates victory with a squawk.
Kevin Mitchell caught the weigh-in, and saw signs of nerves from AJ.
Joshua is in the building, and that building is the SSE Arena, Wembley Arena in old money. In even older money, it’s the Empire Pool. And Pulev, the Cobra, is on the scene too.
Preamble
It’s been a long year since Anthony Joshua won back his IBF, WBA and WBO belts from Andy Ruiz Jr. It was a night when he had to box clever, not be so flashy. His previous defeat to Ruiz redirected the path to the all-British fight of the century, Joshua v Tyson Fury, but that’s back on if there are no hitches tonight. A two-fight deal, and potentially hundreds of millions of pounds is on the line, so Pulev cannot be taken lightly. Not that he’s a man to be taken lightly, and there was a whiff of sulphur about a weigh-in that almost came to premature blows. The only opponent to beat the Bulgarian was Wladimir Klitschko, and he was no slouch; beating the younger Klitsch is still the peak of AJ’s career. He’s 39, but we are now used to boxers being of that age - and older, if not Mike Tyson/Roy Jones age - and can take a punch. Pulev is certainly no ‘bum of the month’, as Muhammad Ali used to call his less able opponents.
