Anthony Joshua and Deontay Wilder fought at the Olympics and won medals for their countries before becoming pro boxers

02/27/2024 12:06 PM

Anthony Joshua and Deontay Wilder have been rivals at the top end of the heavyweight division for most of their careers.

AJ is the former WBA, IBF and WBO world champion while Wilder previously held the WBC crown, though the pair never met in an undisputed showdown.

In December, they boxed on the same card in Saudi Arabia with the aim of setting up a long-awaited clash this year.

However, Wilder suffered a shock defeat to Joseph Parker and so Joshua will now box Francis Ngannou on March 8 instead.

In their younger days, though, Joshua and Wilder shared a common path to world titles when they competed at the Olympics.

At Beijing 2008, a 22-year-old Wilder represented America in the amateur ‘heavyweight’ division.

And ten years ago at London 2012, a 22-year-old AJ took the home nation’s spot in the amateur ‘super-heavyweight’ division.

Wilder was actually in the division below Joshua as the amateur ‘heavyweight’ division is equivalent to the pro cruiserweights, while the amateur ‘super-heavyweight’ equates to the pro heavyweights.

In his first fight, Wilder staggered Algeria’s Abdelaziz Toulbini with a big left hook and the referee gave a standing count.

The American continued to dominate and forced a second standing count before ultimately winning by a wide 10-4 margin on the old amateur points system that was in use at the time.

In his quarter-final, Wilder met a tougher test in Morocco’s Mohamed Arjaoui and only won on a narrow count-back tiebreaker with the scores even at 10-10.

His road came to an end in the semi-final as Italy’s Clemente Russo outclassed Wilder, beating him 7-1.

Regardless, he went home with a bronze medal and decided on his nickname the Bronze Bomber as a result.

Four years later, it was AJ’s turn.

The home favourite had some good fortune in his opening bout as he narrowly made it past Cuba’s Erislandy Savon 17-16, despite many believing he’d lost.

From that point onwards though, Joshua was more convincing.

In his quarter-final he floored China’s Zhilei Zhang, now best known for KOing Joe Joyce, and won 15-11.

AJ outpointed Kazakhstan’s Ivan Dychko 13-11 in his semi-final and then had to face reigning Olympic champion Roberto Cammarelle in the final.

After a tough start, Joshua battled back to level the score at 18-18 as the bout came to a close.

He claimed victory via the count-back tiebreaker and was announced as Olympic champion in front of an ecstatic home crowd.

Both Joshua and Wilder claimed medals at the Olympics and went on to win world titles as professionals.

Whether they ever end up meeting in the ring though still remains to be seen.