Anthony Joshua may not have a shot at winning any world heavyweight belts against Francis Ngannou in Saudi Arabia, but the fight offers a different opportunity altogether to change the narrative around his dream bout with Tyson Fury.
Joshua made it three wins from three with an impressive display against Otto Wallin last month, stopping the big Swede in the fifth round.
It completed what ended up being Joshua's most successful calendar year in professional boxing since 2016 prior to his blockbuster bout with Wladimir Klitschko.
The 34-year-old is on the comeback trail after losing back-to-back fights against Oleksandr Usyk in 2021 and 2022.
Anthony Joshua faces Francis Ngannou next
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It's left Joshua with no heavyweight title belts and saw him drop down the rankings, wrecking any immediate chance of an all-British title clash with Fury.
The two British heavyweights have teased a fight between them for several years now with talks breaking down recently.
Joshua's latest fight against Wallin saw speculation begin once again of a potential future fight with Fury, but the 'Gypsy King' already has a two-fight deal with Usyk with the first scheduled for next month.
With Fury unavailable, Joshua was expected to go up against Croatia's Filip Hrgovic for a vacant IBF world title.
But the two-time heavyweight world champion has instead chosen to fight an exhibition bout against Ngannou.
Fury's last fight was against the UFC megastar, who surprised everyone by putting the British boxer on his back in a narrow defeat.
It appears to be for that very reason that Joshua wants to test himself against Ngannou, to put in a better display against Ngannou than Fury did.
Stopping Wallin in the fifth round was already better than what Fury could manage back in 2019 when the 'Gypsy King' required 47 stitches to a cut above his right eye.
The narrative around a fight between Joshua and Fury has long been that the latter would come out on top given that he's never been beaten.
Anthony Joshua has won his last three fights
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But Eddie Hearn believes a strong performance against Ngannou could change that narrative for people to start backing Joshua as the man to beat in the heavyweight division.
“I believe AJ is going to be become undisputed heavyweight world champion,” Hearn said.
“I said he’s going to beat Wallin, he's going to beat Wilder and he's going to beat Fury.
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"Really, what we've got to focus on now is beating Ngannou. If he can beat Ngannou in style - just like he beat [Otto] Wallin in style - that will just make the demand continue to grow for AJ against Tyson Fury.
“He would have demolished two people that Tyson Fury really struggled against and it will make people start to believe - as I believe they are now - that AJ can win that fight but that's in the future.
"Hopefully Tyson Fury can do the business against Oleksandr Usyk and hopefully AJ can deal with Ngannou but it's a dangerous fight, a huge fight.
"You're going to see these two giants next to each other, both carved out of stone, both punching like mules. It’s a really, really explosive heavyweight match up.”
