No easy road for Joe Joyce who still believes he can reach the pinnacle

JOE JOYCE doesn’t want to talk about the past anymore.

Specifically his two defeats to Zhilei Zhang in 2023 which shattered the momentum he’d been building towards a world title shot. The 38-year-old heavyweight was immediately written off by many who believed his flaws had finally caught up with him, having got away with them in previous fights.

Joyce is still a man mountain of a heavyweight and starts as the favourite to beat Derek Chisora tomorrow night at the O2 Arena in London. However, facing his fellow Londoner doesn’t simply fall under the cliched phrase, “It’s just another fight”. Joyce’s career stands on the edge of no tomorrow if he isn’t successful. Come Sunday morning, he could wake up knowing his time is up as a professional fighter.

Right now Joyce isn’t remembered as the man who won countless medals as an amateur, including an Olympic silver medal (which should have been gold) in 2016, he is known as ‘The Juggernaut’ that got beaten by Zhang twice.

When Boxing News asked him what improvements he had made since those losses, he replied:

“I don’t really want to talk about that past fight(s). I’ve come for Derek Chisora, I’ve improved, I’ve put that behind me, I’ve got in the ring with Kash Ali, and improved. I’m in this place where I’m looking to the future, I’m looking to fight Chisora, and then going forward from there.”

Joyce’s answers stop and start when he speaks to the media. Unlike Chisora, he isn’t a talker, but his awkwardness and uncomfortable body language are slowly disappearing in interviews or conversations, as he proved this past week when his opponent attempted to run rings around him. The impression given is that Joyce does not like the Chisora we see during fight week or promotional activities involving the two of them.

Joyce says he knows what to expect from Chisora on July 27
Image: Stephen Dunkley/Queensberry

“You know what you’re going to get with Chisora,” Joyce says.

“He’s always going to bring unpredictability, excitement, war, that’s what it says on the tin, and I’m going to have a piece of that on Saturday night.”

The Joyce-Chisora tin would read, “Consume quickly; item may dissolve after 15-20 minutes” because there is no hiding the fact that these two long-in-the-tooth fighters don’t want to go 12 rounds while throwing hurtful hands at one another. Chisora believes the fight will be over in five rounds.

While Joyce says, “It’s going to be all out war isn’t it? ‘War’ and ‘The Juggernaut’ collide. It’s going to be all-out war.

“I always aim to get the stoppage, always pushing for that,” he adds.

“And to be an exciting fighter, get the stoppages, and get back in the driving seat, because I’m top 10 still. But I need to push up to the top of the level to get a proper heavyweight title. I was so close to the WBO [title] so it’s getting back into the right position to go up to the pinnacle of the sport.”

Joyce has so much to be proud of in his career. From a two-time ABA champion to a British, Commonwealth, and European heavyweight champion in his 12th fight, he won against Daniel Dubois, which is beginning to age well. You could spend hours talking about what happened in between but that’s all in the past. Joyce insists and believes greater memories are still to come in a career that has been long, winding and with a few bumps along the way.

“It hasn’t been an easy road, it hasn’t been an easy career,” he says.

“It’s tough when you’ve been doing it for so many years. Any job you find ways to improve and make it better, but it’s still a job at the end of the day, it’s something I love and I enjoy. I’ve done all the different sports, and this was a sport that brought me success and excitement. I’ve still got the motivation and the love for it, and I’m fighting in London, my hometown, so I’m really excited.”