Anthony Joshua regains his belts by boring everyone who paid for PPV in Saudi Arabia on a thankfully early Saturday night fight night.
You can read up about the build up to the fight in the desert and the reasons Anthony Joshua is the unified World Champion despite Detony Wilder holding the WBC belt here.
I am so glad I didn't waste the £25.99 Sky Box Office were charging to watch the rematch of AJ and Andy Ruiz Jr in the desert on Saturday night. There are so many free streaming services and apps out there that you can just put on your phone and mirror to your TV you don't need to until the FBI shuts them down.
The only saving grace to the 12 rounds of AJ circle Andy Ruiz Jr with jabs all night was that it was before 12pm and I didn't have to pay to suffer to watch it.
The fight basically consisted of 12 rounds of a very in shape and seemingly giant Anthony Joshua circle a flat footed and very overweight Andy Ruiz Jr, who had obviously been training at McDonald's since the last fight, with jabs all night.
It was (as some called it), a display of artful boxing. I suppose it was in that AJ knew if he got too close to Ruiz one punch to his glass chin could put him down like the 4 times he hit the canvas in Madison Gardens. So to ensure Ruiz couldn't get close enough to him, he used his longer reach and his jab. Plus the fact Ruiz couldn't get close due to his unfitness we didn't even get to see one flurry of a tear up.
No close contact jabs going back and forth and upper cuts, ducks, weaves and bobs. It was literally AJ circling Ruiz all night with jabs to his face.
He won on points of course and got his belts back. Then Ruiz came over and interrupted his interview to invite himself to another match up. I don't think I would even bother to find a free way to watch that fight.
What I want to see is one heavyweight belt for everyone to fight for. AJ may have "unified" 4 belts but Detony Wilder and Tyson Fury are ignoring the opportunity to take them off him and Wilder seems happy with his WBC belt.
Why won't Wilder fight AJ?
He obviously has a chin ripe for the "bomb squad" as Wilder likes to boom down a mic after knocking someone out who looked like beating him all night. So why doesn't Wilder and AJ meet for a proper unification of the belts and then we can see if AJ has the boxing skills to take on someone with equal fitness and strength in the ring.
Let's just hope it's not in Saudi Arabia if you have any morals.
It's a boxing blog so I shouldn't really go there but if no-one mentions it then we all live in ignorance.
Why we are allowing Saudi Arabia a country involved in cutting US journalists up alive such as Jamal Khashoggi in Turkey's embassy before acting puzzled that we all complained about it, to hold boxing matches?
Well we have been letting the country cut peoples heads and other limbs off after Friday prayers for decades now. We've got to have that black gold and of course our Arms Industry is a "national interest" according to Tony Blair when BAE bribed some princes to sell weapons to our "ally".
So if it means women who are gang raped are whipped 200 times in public and spend 6 months in jail, and our weapons are used in the genocide Saudi Arabia is committing in Yemen causing famine and disease then it's okay if we get to see a boxing match before midnight now and then.
Lets forget about all that, they are just a country in the process of modernising from the 7th century. However to listen to Antony Joshua praise Saudi Arabia multiple times after the fight made my stomach turn just a bit.
So who cares what this backward country tries to do to improve their image as long as we get to see Muslim boxers like Amir Khan and AJ choose to fight in the desert before midnight for once so we don't all waste our time and money.
Forget the beheadings and public lashing of rape victims. We get to see some boring boxing now Saudi Arabia has entered the game.
Watch the full fight here, the rematch between Andy Ruiz Jr and Anthony Joshua (before YouTube removes it of course - excuse the foreign commentary but you don't really need it)
FULL FIGHT - AJ v Andy Ruiz Jr - REMATCH
And if you just want to see the highlights in case the full fight goes then....
HIGHLIGHTS - AJ v Andy Ruiz Jr - REMATCH
Tell me what you think about the night.
Write anything you want in the comments whether it was about the £25.99 PPV price for such a boring fight, Andy Ruiz Jr not getting himself into shape before the fight, the tactics of AJ to just circle and jab or about Saudi Arabian princes going off to Dubai for some non Islamic fun with prostitutes, alcohol and drugs.
Just leave a comment below.
