Anthony Joshua Is Taking A Huge Pay Cut To Fight Kubrat Pulev

Anthony Joshua faces Kubrat Pulev on Saturday night, returning to the ring over a year since his victory over Andy Ruiz in Saudi Arabia.

However, the 31-year-old won't be matching the £66 million payday from the Ruiz bout that was reported by Talksport.

According to the Daily Telegraph, this time round Joshua will be taking home around £10 million - which still isn't a bad wage.

This means that Joshua will be earning a whopping £56 million less than he did when he reclaimed the WBA, WBO, and IBF world heavyweight titles from Ruiz last year.

This may be slightly disappointing to the two-time world heavyweight champion, haing told GQ, "I need to be a billionaire," a few years back.

However, before he starts worrying about his earnings, Joshua will have to concentrate on defeating Pulev.

The Bulgarian holds a similar record to the Brit, with 28 victorys and one defeat - against Wladimir Klitschko. To compare, Joshua has 23 victories and one defeat - conquering Klitschko but falling in a shock loss to Ruiz in 2019.

Joshua spoke ahead of the fight to warn that a year without fighting could leave him rusty: "This year has just thrown every obstacle at us all. I might go in there, I can tell you that I'm a million dollars, I feel good, I've been knocking everyone out in sparring.

"I'm the one that's coming up now and I'm going to be the undisputed champ and I go in there on Saturday night and I [might] get my head punched in because I've got ring rust. Who knows?

Meanwhile, Pulev is confident of the upset: "He's strong. He has power, and that power is very dangerous. But I am technically better and I think this is very important in this fight. We see a lot of mistakes from Anthony. A lot of bad sides to him. I think these mistakes, and the bad sides, have stayed. When I am good, I beat him well."