Chisora on Joshua's Prenga Scare: 'He Came Into the Ring Sleeping'

Anthony Joshua nearly walked into disaster on Saturday. The two-time heavyweight champion, now 29-4 with 26 knockouts, was dropped twice in the opening round by 35-year-old Albanian underdog Kristian Prenga before rallying to land clean in round two and force the stoppage. It was supposed to be a routine night. It turned into a five-minute panic attack for anyone holding an AJ ticket.

Derek Chisora, who's shared a locker-room ecosystem with Joshua for over a decade and carries his own 36-14 (23 KO) ledger, didn't sugar-coat it. Speaking to Seconds Out, Chisora said Joshua walked through the ropes half-asleep and abandoned the one tool that keeps a heavyweight upright: the jab. According to Chisora, AJ decided to go in there without using it and got laid out for the trouble.

The Punch Resistance Question

The knockdowns reopened an old wound. Every time Joshua gets touched, the same conversation restarts — can he take a shot at the top level? Chisora waved it away. He argued that nobody in the media is a doctor, so nobody's qualified to declare Joshua finished, and that only AJ himself gets to make that call. Fair point, even if the delivery was blunt.

Chisora's take on the actual punch resistance debate was even simpler: he doesn't care. He pointed out that size is irrelevant — hit anyone in the right spot at the right time and they're going down, heavyweight or not. What impressed him was the second act, once Joshua settled and got his hands moving. That's the version of AJ Chisora wants to see in November.

Because there's a much bigger fight waiting. Tyson Fury, ranked #3 and now 36-2-1 (25 KO), kept his own momentum rolling on Friday with a seventh-round retirement win over Mariusz Wach — his second victory of the calendar year. The long-delayed all-British showdown is being lined up for November, with Madison Square Garden reportedly the frontrunner to host it.

That's the context that makes Saturday's wobble matter. If Prenga could put Joshua on the canvas twice, the natural worry is what Fury does with those same openings. Chisora isn't interested in the hand-wringing. He just wants the fight made, and his message was clear: forget the noise about whether AJ is done, get him in there with Fury and let it settle itself. On current form, that November night in New York can't come quickly enough.