Joshua, after suffering a second successive defeat to Usyk, picked up two of the belts and slammed them to the ground. He then stormed out of the ring.
He was later convinced by his team to return to the ring.
However, Joshua in his press conference explained his comments were “from the heart” and came as a result of him being “mad” at himself. Joshua, still in his emotional state, said: “When you’re trying to do things from the heart and everyone is just not understanding. It was just from the heart. I was mad at myself. Not anyone else just myself.
So I thought, I’ve got to get out of here because I’m mad. Like anyone, when you’re angry, you might do st¥pid things. I was m@d and then I realized, ‘Oh s***, this is sport. Let me do the right thing and come back. I just spoke from my heart. It’s been so tough. You see AJ holding it together, yeah, and I’m a hustler so I try put things together. Try work hard and put things together and make sure my team’s good.
But it comes at a cost, a big cost. It’ll never break me, but it takes real strength for it not to break me. And tonight, there’s a little crack in the armour when I took a loss. And I think you just saw me just upset. And with the speech, I was just speaking about where I come from. I was on the roads, really.
And I made a transition to boxing that really changed my life and brought me closer to God and brought me closer to meeting so many people. And I just kind of laid it all on the line with my speech. But let’s not forget the champ Oleksandr Usyk. He put on a phenomenal performance as well. So credit to him.
I can’t remember what I said in the ring because it was just so passionate. But I just want to say thank you to him for taking part in a great historical fight as well. It takes two to tango. I was just so upset.”
