These are the Top 4 Reasons why Aj lost to Ruiz:
The former IBF, IBO, WBO, and WBA Undisputed unified champion Anthony Olaseni Joshua unified the boxing heavyweight division after defeating Wladimir Klitschko by knockout on April 24th, 2017 at the Wembley stadium in England.
It was rollercoaster for him with an impressive record of 22 fights with no defeat with 21ko’s and winning one on a unanimous decision. Still, currently Anthony Joshua’s rollercoaster ride in the heavyweight boxing division has been cut short after losing to American born Mexican boxer Andy Ruiz by knockout in the 7th round at the Madison square garden New York.
This occurrence has brought controversies and opened the road for more competitiveness in the heavyweight division.
Although Joshua speaking to Sky Sports immediately after his bout on June 2nd, 2019 said
“it’s a minor setback and wishes Ruiz well.”
But we all know this will bring about a lot of unexpected happenings later in this division, so here are four main reasons why Joshua fell short in his bout with Andy Ruiz.
These are the Top 4 Reasons why Aj lost to Ruiz:
1. focus: Anthony Joshua is a boxer who is patient and mentally calm. He has been running some negotiations for about two years with his big competitor “Deontay Wilder” who is holding the WBC belt and has been waxing lyrical since 2017.
Joshua’s knocked out Wladimir Klitschko, dethroning him as the world heavyweight. AJ and Wilder have been trying to get a fight since 2017. Due to pressure from the media and fellow compatriots psychologically, Joshua was distracted with the wilder’s bout and lost the focus of the fact that he fought with Jarrell Miller, which brought a lot of controversies until Jarrell Miller made his mandatory fighter. He had a way of getting into Joshua’s skin during their meeting in the USA.
Jarrell Miller, who later failed a drug test, was dropped as Joshua’s opponent for the June 2nd bout. Meanwhile, Joshua has been preparing to fight Miller. This brought about an impromptu opponent,” Andy Ruiz,” where Joshua was given a six weeks notice to fight Ruiz.
Training in boxing depends on the kind of fighter you are about to fight, brought a setback on Joshua’s balance mentally.
Top 4 Reasons why Aj lost to Ruiz
He needed a psychologist more at this period before his bout with Andy Ruiz.
On the other hand, Andy Ruiz was mentally balanced and stable, making statements of knocking out Joshua. Joshua, before the bout, said nothing much about his fight with Ruiz showing that he underestimated him but kept talking about his match with Wilder, which hasn’t seen the light of day yet.
2. Didn’t feel at home: The majority of Joshua’s fight has been in the UK. He has a great team, and a great promoter AJ also has the media pedigree and can bring in a lot of money since he unified the heavyweight division he hadn’t fought outside of the UK before, Which makes him unique. Meanwhile, he doesn’t need to leave his country to prove his talent. Still, some theories say otherwise, fighting in your comfort zone behind your fans and with the support of your fans, mentally and in your subconscious, you will not want to disappoint your compatriots.
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But the reverse was the case with his bout in Ruiz because he wasn’t 100 percent comfortable, and the American fans were a little bit hostile with AJ, which also contributed to him losing to Ruiz.
3. Poor preparation and Bad team: This had a lot to do with his loss to Ruiz because it was widely speculated that Joshua was knocked out by his sparring partner while training, which led to Aj suffering a concussion.
According to Live intense” symptoms of concussion subsides after only ten days but should still wait till the full 30 days before engaging in physical activity” if this was true, then his team’s whole wasn’t professional about this.
Eddie Hearn came out to debunk the statement according to BBC Sport, he said
“Got knocked out in sparring? No, he didn’t, the build-up, training camp the organization is a very professional organization. Zero excuses,”.
According to “Frank Warren” of the boxing scene, he said
“He has remained with his amateur trainer and many others I suspect, was surprised by the dialogue between them in between rounds. He added that Joshua uses a publicly funded facility and trainer as a highly rewarded professional I don’t think it’s right anyway.
Also, Bunce of BBC sports said
“we flagged up a nasally feel in Joshua’s voice on Monday, clear sign of some sort of cold or maybe run down not enough to predict the shock that came”
there were also rumors of Ajs dad arguing with Eddie Hearn and blaming him for letting the fight hold.
Lennox Lewis also gave his thoughts on Sky sports and felt Aj should have changed his coach and training team.
4. exposed: We have all seen Joshua’s bout with different boxers, and we all know that he has a weak jaw, and we saw that in his fight against Wladimir Klitschko where a lot of fans were scared but we have never seen Joshua fall flat on the canvas before.
But with the result of his bout with Ruiz, it is no news to us that Joshua can also fall, and this is due to his weak defense we saw that in his fight against Wladimir Klitschko where he was knocked down for the first time in his career.
Aj has to work on his defense currently than the offense he has been exposed by Ruiz and a lot of boxers he had knocked seeing that will love to take their pound of flesh.
Meanwhile, before his bout with Ruiz speaking with Sky sports Ruiz said
Studying his previous fight carefully, and I notice that he is always on his front foot with all of his opponents and has never been put on his back foot.
He will be the first to put him on his back foot, which Ajs team never thought of taking note of, but with this happening, Ruiz has ultimately exposed Joshua.
He has to be excellent both offensively and defensively, Joshua needs to balance his defensive and attacking approach if he wants to bounce back as a world heavyweight champion.