Anthony Joshua takes on Jake Paul tonight but he has already mapped out his 2026 given the high likelihood he will demolish the YouTuber
11:00, 19 Dec 2025
Anthony Joshua already knows the plan for next year - including a showdown with Tyson Fury.
The former two-time heavyweight world champion will take on Jake Paul tonight in a controversial fight which has been sanctioned as a professional contest. Joshua is odds-on to demolish the novice boxer who made his name as a YouTuber and move on to much bigger and better things.
But the Brit will need to shed some ring rust having been out of action since he as brutally knocked out by Daniel Dubois at Wembley last September. He might not get that against Paul given the social media star's lack of experience - this will be just his 14th fight.
And Paul's record has been padded with wins over a basketball star, a fellow YouTuber and a number of over-the-hill ex-MMA stars, not to mention a 58-year-old Mike Tyson whom he outpointed last year. And so Joshua plans to have another warm-up bout which has been pencilled in for February 14 in Saudi Arabia.
No opponent has been named or mooted but it will need to be a step up from Paul to go someway to bridging the gap between him and Fury whom Joshua is slated to face in London in September. The British rivals have been at each other's throats for the best part of a decade now but have never met in the ring.
But their rivalry exploded again this week when Fury took exception to Joshua saying he could kill Paul in the ring tonight. "I've just been sent a video of Anthony Joshua talking about, 'If he kills somebody, he'd kill somebody in a boxing ring'," he said. "I think he's a little bit long in the tooth to be talking s***e like that. He's 37 years old, at the end of his career fighting a YouTuber, a Disney Channel guy who [Tyson's brother] Tommy beat.
"And now he's talking about killing him and all that to try and sell the fight. He's barking up the wrong tree, idiot. Here's a fun fact, if I ever come across you, bum, I'm knocking you dead spark out. I ain't a YouTuber or a man half your size, I am him, the man."
Joshua hit back, insisting he will knock Fury out if and when they finally meet. "I'm in my own lane and I'm fighting Jake; he is my focus," he said. "Tyson can sit around doing videos, but he's not the one getting in the ring, Jake is. "Why am I sitting around waiting for a guy that likes to do more Instagram videos than fight?
I'm looking for real fighters and Tyson's not a real fighter in my eyes. So unless he wants to fight, he needs to shut the f*** up. He needs to be humbled. I wish he had been knocked out by Oleksandr Usyk, but I swear if I ever get the opportunity, I'll make sure I lay him flat on his back."