Canelo Alvarez thinks the public needs to refrain from heaping too much criticism on Anthony Joshua as it relates to his behavior after his tough loss to Oleksandr Usyk.
Shortly after Ukraine’s Usyk was declared the winner, via split decision, of their 12-round WBO, WBA, and IBF heavyweight title unification rematch in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, earlier this month, Joshua started to act uncharacteristically. First, he took two of Usyk’s belts (the WBA and Ring magazine) and tossed them out of the ring, and then he went on an extended, bizarre rant. Joshua’s actions were roundly lambasted by the boxing world, with many suggesting he was a sore loser.
Joshua, to his credit, apologized for the way he comported himself after the fight. In a sign of his contrition, the former heavyweight champion also broke down in tears during the post-fight press conference. “I let myself down,” Joshua later said in a tweet.
Asked about Joshua’s incident, Alvarez expressed sympathy with the Londoner and cautioned from judging him too harshly given what he may have been dealing with during his training camp.
“You never know what happened in his camp,” Alvarez told ESNews. “You can’t just … maybe for him it was really hard to take that (the loss). You need to respect that because you had never been in that position, you had never been in that situation. You need to respect [that].”
Joshua, who linked up with California trainer Robert Garcia for the Uysk rematch, has expressed interest in fighting once more before the end of year, possibly in December, according to his promoter Eddie Hearn of Matchroom Boxing.
Alvarez, for one, sounded confident that Joshua will return to the ring in one piece.
“He’s gonna come back,” Alvarez said.
The 32-year-old Alvarez (57-2-2, 39 KOs) is preparing to defend his WBO, WBA, WBC, and IBF 168-pound titles against Gennadiy Golovkin in their undisputed super middleweight trilogy Sept. 17 at T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas on DAZN pay-per-view.
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