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Anthony Joshua knocked Francis Ngannou clean out in the second round of their much-hyped fight today in Saudi Arabia, scoring three knockdowns in two rounds on route to an easy victory.
Ngannou (0-2) was having a decent first round before he foolishly switched to a southpaw stance and was dropped. The second round saw Ngannou stay orthodox, but he got dropped again by Joshua’s obviously superior timing, and then finished off brutally with a monstrous right hand.
The official time of the knockout was 2:38 of round two.
With due respect to Ngannou, this is really what should happen when a novice boxer from the mixed martial arts world fights a top professional, though of course that’s not always been the case.
Tyson Fury, who looked on from the crowd, absolutely didn’t do this to Ngannou last year, and it turns out that perhaps trying to clinch with a guy who knows a lot more about clinch work from his day job, and is physically stronger than you, is in fact not a great idea.
Using boxing and instincts honed over many years worked out quite well for Joshua (28-3, 25 KO), who doesn’t really prove anything with this win to anyone other than the WBC and the DAZN broadcast team, but he made a lot of money and kept his name in the headlines, which is where we’re at with a lot of things in this sport today.
“It is what it is,” Joshua said after the fight. “He’s a great champion and this doesn’t take away anything from his capabilities. He can come again. I told him he shouldn’t leave boxing. He can do well. He’s two fights in and he’s fought the best. He can go a long way if he stays dedicated, but it’s up to him.”
Joshua said he wants the winner of the May 18 fight between Tyson Fury and Oleksandr Usyk next, but that’s going to be tough to do, given the fact Fury and Usyk have a two-fight deal, but promoter Eddie Hearn said they’ve been told by Turki Alalshikh that Joshua will fight the winner of Fury vs Usyk.
“On this form, there is no man in the world who can beat him,” Hearn said.