Jarrell Miller can’t beat me even on his best day, says Anthony Joshua

So much of the early buildup to Anthony Joshua’s forthcoming defence of the WBA, WBO and IBF heavyweight titles has centred on those the British champion will not be fighting on 1 June at Madison Square Garden instead of on Brooklyn’s Jarrell Miller. That is more than fine with Joshua, who understands that fans would rather be served a long-awaited summit meeting with Deontay Wilder or Tyson Fury than Miller, an unfancied former kickboxer who has been installed as a 5-1 underdog in the contest.

“My view on the whole situation is they’ll appreciate you when you’re done,” Joshua said on Tuesday at the Garden. “So right now I’m just going with where the best opportunities are and I’m making the right decisions for the long term. I’ll beat up Jarrell Miller, and what that then does help me do is say to Wilder: ‘Look, if you don’t want want to come to the UK, you’ve seen what we’ve done in the US, so let’s work on having it here on both of our terms.’”

Joshua, unbeaten in 22 professional bouts, did little to conceal his view of the fight as a proof of concept for his appeal in the US – “I’ll be deadly serious: Jarrell can’t beat me, even on his best day,” he said – so he has left the heavy lifting to the outspoken Miller, who has already been working overtime selling the fight by sheer force of personality. On Tuesday alone Miller accused Joshua of being “fake”, an “Uncle Tom” and a “giant pussy” – and that was before it got personal.

“It’s just jealousy in my opinion,” Joshua said of Miller’s bluster. “Just hate for no reason. I respect my opponents. But if they disrespect me, they get the worst of me as well.”

The 2012 Olympic champion was quick to break down Miller’s limitations as a fighter, including his weight (more than 315lb for his most recent fight) and a casual mention of the challenger’s nine-month suspension for the banned stimulant methylhexaneamine handed down by the California State Athletic Commission in 2014.

“He’s slow,” added a slim-looking Joshua, who said he is walking around at 115kg. “He’s not a puncher. Ex-kickboxer. Probably be better off in the NFL. Substance abuse. Got caught on PEDs. I can’t really respect that, so talk is cheap. I’m just going to back that up in the ring.”

He added: “I keep hearing about his stamina and that he’s a pressure fighter. A fighter gets tired when they get hit, and he gets hit a lot. It doesn’t matter how good his stamina is. If I keep on punching – his jaw, his body – he’ll soon fade. He’ll soon find out what it’s like.

“The best chance he has is to land a big right hand or a big left hook, but that’s not really going to happen, so he’s going to get beat.”

source: theguardian.com