Joshua bids to emulate Ali as 3-time heavyweight champ with Dubois win

Three boxers from an elite club of heavyweight greats to have been three-time world champions.

Anthony Joshua can put his name on that exclusive list by disposing of a British rival who sees himself as the future of the sport’s marquee category.

He can do it on quite the stage, too.

Joshua, a darling of British Boxing ever since winning Olympic gold at the London Games in 2012, is looking to complete his late-career rebuild by beating Daniel Dubois to reclaim the IBF belt in front of around 96,000 fans at Wembley Stadium in London on Saturday.

It is one of the biggest crowds for any British sporting event - and that’s something Joshua is used to after selling out the UK’s biggest stadia for years. Indeed, it was at Wembley where he produced his greatest performance in defeating Wladimir Klitschko in epic fashion in 2017 to become a two-belt world champ.

As for the 27-year-old Dubois, a somewhat accidental world champion after taking the IBF crown vacated by Oleksandr Usyk, this is fairly new territory. It’s his first title defense and second world championship fight - Joshua has had 12 of them, of which 10 have been for unified titles - as he looks to establish his name atop the heavyweight scene.

A win for Dubois (21-2, with 20 KOs) and it will be seen as a definitive changing of the guard. The pretender will then be the big man in town, with huge riches in the offing in potential future fights against Usyk or Tyson Fury, who meet in a rematch on Dec. 21 in Saudi Arabia for Usyk’s WBA, WBC and IBO heavyweight belts.

For Joshua (28-3, with 25 KOs), it would mean climbing the mountain once again - or even hanging up his gloves.

“I’ve been to the well,” Joshua said. “Dan’s fighting someone who is willing to die in there.”

The 34-year-old from Watford, just outside London, faced a career reset after losing back-to-back fights against Usyk, soon after his first pro defeat - a shocker to Andy Ruiz Jr. in 2019.

Joshua got rid of his long-time trainer, set up camps in the US instead of England, and tried to change his strategy. He had lost twice to Usyk, a smaller man, and it made him realize Boxing is as much about skill and ring craft as power and brutality.

The rebuild has seen him win four straight fights - against Jermaine Franklin, Robert Helenius, Otto Wallin and then former UFC champion Francis Ngannou - and each performance has been better than the last.

Agence France-Presse