Anthony Joshua and Jake Paul made an eye-watering £69,000 per second of their fight in Miami on Saturday night, it has been revealed.
The unlikely duo went head-to-head in the highly-anticipated bout at the Florida city’s Kaseya Center, with Joshua unsurprisingly reigning supreme in the sixth round.
Referee Christopher Young called a halt to proceedings after Paul was floored by a right hand from Joshua, who walked away to celebrate as the American hit the canvas.
Many had questioned exactly why a two-time heavyweight champion was reducing himself to fighting a YouTuber turned cruiserweight who once lost to Tommy Fury, though the answer was pretty clear.
In agreeing to the Netflix-broadcast scrap, Paul and Joshua split a reported fund of £68.5million. That means that in the 989 seconds which the fight lasted, each boxer earned a remarkable £69,000 every single second.
It’s however thought that AJ is expected to take home a significant amount less than Paul because of his UK residency. According to AceOdds, around 37 per cent of his money – £25.6m – will go directly to the IRS.
Anthony Joshua and Jake Paul made an eye-watering £69,000 per second of their fight in Miami on Saturday night, it has been revealed
The unlikely duo went head-to-head in the highly-anticipated bout at the Floridacity’s Kaseya Center, with Joshua unsurprisingly reigning supreme in the sixth round
Speaking after his victory, Joshua gave credit to his opponent and admitted it took him ‘a bit longer than expected’ to put an end to proceedings.
‘It wasn’t the best performance,’ he said.
‘The end goal was to get Jake Paul, pin him down and hurt him. That has been the request and that was on my mind. Took a bit longer than expected but the right hand found the destination.
‘Jake Paul has done really well tonight, I want to give him his props. He got up, time and time again. It was difficult in there for him, but he kept on trying to find a way through.
‘You have to give Jake his respect for trying, trying and trying. But he came up against a real fighter tonight that’s had a 15-month lay-off.’
The 36-year-old and his promoter Eddie Hearn also looked ahead to the future, urging Tyson Fury to sign on the dotted line and set-up arguably the biggest fight in British boxing history next year.
Fury is expected to come out of retirement next year after stepping away from the sport following back-to-back losses to Oleksandr Usyk.
Hearn said: ‘We want the Tyson Fury fight of course. That’s the fight, the biggest fight.
‘We can do that, by the way, straight away. No interim fights. If Tyson’s ready and AJ is ready, we don’t have to fight in February or March. I think he’s saying eight weeks, 24 hours to sign a contract.’
Before Joshua added: ‘The best promoter in the world has been speaking with Turki [Al-Sheikh], His Excellency, Riyadh Season, and now he’s going to relay those messages and speak to my training team.
‘I’m a strong guy. I want to push on – but the coaches, it’s really up to them, they’re the ones that guide me. Fighters will always fight, coaches are there to guide us.
‘They know what I’ve been through over the x amount of weeks I’ve been with them so it’s up to them to make a decision. They’re going to speak with Eddie, and then hopefully in a week or so, I’ll have some news.’
