The final bell sounded early, but the fight finished late. Even after Anthony Joshua and Jermaine Franklin had finished trading blows, they were trading barbs in the ring. Meanwhile, outside of the squared circle, there was the threat of fists being thrown.
In some ways, it was the most exciting spell of the night, following a cluster of 12 messy rounds. The blood smeared on Joshua’s pristine white shorts, and on the white shirt of the referee, was symbolic of the fight that could have been, rather than the fight that was. And for “AJ”, this was arguably a case of the win that should have been, rather than the win that was.
The Briton entered the O2 Arena in desperate need of a victory, potentially to salvage a decorated but complicated career, off the back of two straight defeats by Oleksandr Usyk. And Joshua, in the eyes of many, needed not only a victory but a convincing one to do that – the kind of knockout that he produced so often in the past to enthrall a generation. Under a rare pressure on Saturday night, that finish eluded Joshua.
At the very venue where Joshua took out Kevin Johnson, Gary Cornish, Dillian Whyte, Charles Martin and Dominic Breazeale in five consecutive fights between 2015 and 2016, fans were forced to feed on nostalgia. In fact, highlights of those knockouts were shown on the big screens at the O2 before the main event began, but Joshua was unable to revisit the past in a way that would have saved his future for sure. As it was, the 33-year-old did ensure that he will fight another day, but he failed to answer some of the most important questions posed ahead of this bout.
As a result of this uninspiring unanimous-decision win, the question of ‘Who is next for Joshua?’ cannot even be answered with ease. Franklin marked a step down in competition, and still Joshua laboured to victory here, meaning a discussed rematch with Dillian Whyte could even be deemed slightly too dangerous to risk.
