Anthony Joshua is back on a date that matters. The two-time heavyweight champion will face Kristian Prenga in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, on July 25 in a warm-up bout that puts him one step closer to the Tyson Fury fight boxing has been circling for months.
That return has been a long time coming. Joshua’s first appearance since his December 2025 victory over Jake Paul will come after seven months away from the ring, and he says the break has left him ready to come back stronger, physically and mentally, than before.
“I feel solid,” Joshua said. “I’m very grateful for this opportunity. It’s nice doing what I love.” He added that boxing still gives him structure and purpose, saying: “I got into boxing to reshape my mind and identity, to make me a better person. It’s doing the same for me now. It’s reshaping my life and giving me purpose.”
That message carries extra weight because the time away was not just about training. Joshua has been absent from boxing for an extended period after the deaths of two friends in a car accident in Nigeria, and he has spoken about trying to push through that grief while rebuilding for the ring. In that context, his insistence that he feels strong again is not just fight-week noise. It is the point of the comeback.
Joshua said the layoff and the setbacks have not dulled his belief. “Life throws many obstacles at us,” he said. “I stand before you now as a boxer, but I’ve got things happening in my life. I think this is the right place for me to be.” He also said he is “building myself up to be stronger than I’ve ever been” and that he has realised he is “a lot stronger than I ever thought I was.”
The immediate job is Prenga, not Fury. But the Jeddah bout is being treated as the final step on Joshua’s path toward a long-anticipated heavyweight showdown, and his camp has already included spells working under Oleksandr Usyk. What happens on July 25 will not settle the bigger picture, but it will decide whether Joshua moves into that next conversation with momentum or with more waiting attached to his name.
For now, the next confirmed date is the one in Saudi Arabia. If Joshua handles Prenga cleanly, the door stays open for Fury. If not, the heavyweight picture he has been chasing can shift again in an instant.
