There are various title fights happening in April, but the first day of the month brings the fight we are most interested in here at Bravose – even though there is no belt on the line.
What is at stake is the initial step on a possible road to redemption, as Anthony Joshua makes his first appearance in the ring this year.
AJ (24-3, 22 KOs) will take on American boxer Jermaine Franklin (21-1, 14 KOs) on Saturday 1 April at the O2 Arena in London in a huge night for not only the Brit, but also for the heavyweight division as a whole.
Coming in to the fight off the back of two losses to the unified world heavyweight champion Oleksandr Usyk, a loss for AJ could mean the very real prospect of retirement from the sport altogether.
A victory, however, could see him set his sights on reclaiming the belts he lost to Ukrainian Usyk back in September 2021.
And boxing fans like us are still feeling as much anticipation for the fight, even though AJ has not won since the pandemic days of December 2020, when he defeated Kubrat Pulev at the SSE Arena in London.
Hopefully the 2012 Olympic gold medallist can experience that winning feeling once more as he enters this period of rebuilding with his new trainer Derrick James.
But while AJ is a front runner, we should not forget that Franklin pushed Dillian Whyte all the way in their bout in November last year.
The bout ended in a majority decision in Whyte’s favour, despite Franklin believing he had done enough to actually win the bout.
Add to that the potential distraction for AJ of thinking ahead to what a win could mean for the noise around a future showdown with Tyson Fury or Joe Joyce - there is certainly a huge amount on the line for someone who is now viewed as a vulnerable fighter.
While many outcomes seem possible for this fight, we are backing AJ to walk away from the bout as the victor, most likely with a win on points.
From there, we cannot wait to find out what he will do next.
Here we share a list of the fights to be taking place during April 2023.
Saturday 1 April at O2 Arena, London, UK – Eddie Hearn’s Matchroom
- Anthony Joshua vs Jermaine Franklin (Heavyweight)
Saturday 8 April at Ariake Arena, Tokyo, Japan – Akihiko Honda’s Teiken
- Kenshiro Teraji vs Anthony Olascuaga (WBA and WBC Light-Flyweight World Titles)
- Takuma Inoue vs Liborio Solis (WBA Bantamweight World Title)
Saturday 8 April at Prudential Center, Newark, USA – Bob Arum’s Top Rank
- Shakur Stevenson vs Shuichiro Yoshino (Lightweight)
Saturday 8 April at Boeing Center at Tech Port, San Antonio, USA – Eddie Hearn’s Matchroom
- Jesse Rodriguez vs Cristian Gonzalez (WBO Flyweight World Title)
- Marlon Tapales vs Murodjon Akhmadaliev (WBA and IBF Super-Bantamweight World Titles)
Saturday 15 April at Copper Box Arena in the Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park, London, UK – Frank Warren’s Queensberry
- Zhilei Zhang vs Joe Joyce (WBO ‘Interim’ Heavyweight Belt)
Saturday 22 April at Cardiff International Arena, Cardiff, UK – Eddie Hearn’s Matchroom
- Shavkat Rakhimov vs Joe Cordina (IBF Super-Featherweight World Title)
Saturday 22 April at T-Mobile Arena, Las Vegas, USA – Al Haymon’s PBC and Oscar De La Hoya’s Golden Boy
- Gervonta Davis vs Ryan Garcia (136lbs Catchweight)
- David Morrell Jr vs Yamaguchi Falcao (WBA ‘Regular’ Super-Middleweight Belt)
- Gabriel Rosado vs Bektemir Melikuziev 2 (Super-Middleweight)
