Most fighters honour the whole “what happens in sparring stays in sparring” adage.
But sometimes, it benefits a boxer to publicise what took place in the gym and that was David Price’s thinking when he revealed what went down when he shared the ring with Anthony Joshua in 2011.
‘AJ’ was drafted in by Price prior to his clash with Tom Dallas but it wasn’t until last year that Price went public with the fact that he’d managed to drop Joshua.
“I brought it up to generate interest for his team to say ‘we will fight Price’. That was my ace in the pack, at the time,” Price told Sky Sports on Wednesday.
“I had held onto it until the time was right to let the cat out of the bag. Normally, sparring is just sparring. But when there’s an opportunity at a world title on the line, I thought I’d get the information out there.”
Price never got the shot at Joshua’s world title and he’s most recently had to settle for fighting for European gold.
Joshua, meanwhile, remains at the pinnacle of the heavyweight division and will hope to add the WBO title to his collection when he meets Joseph Parker in Cardiff in March.
Parker and his team have repeatedly questioned Joshua’s ability to take a shot, citing Price’s knockdown of the London 2012 gold medallist as evidence.
“I landed a hard shot, a good shot,” Price explained. “Similar to the shot Wladimir Klitschko landed on him. I caught Joshua with a throwaway left hook. I sold him that, then caught him with a big right hand.
"It’s the worst kept secret in British boxing." https://t.co/vkw5z1FeFZ
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“He fell forwards, onto his face. He went down heavily. He tried to get up but was on unsteady legs, and the trainer pulled him out.”
Price did wonder about Joshua’s chin at the time but has since been convinced of the unbeaten Brit’s ability to take a punch.
“I don’t knock many people out in sparring, with those big gloves,” he continued. “When I did that to him, I wondered: is he fragile? Then I heard he was stopped in the European Championships. But now, he’s proving to be okay. He didn’t go into a shell, and he isn’t gun shy. He got rocked by Dillian Whyte and put down by Klitschko, but he can hold a shot.”
In explaining what happened against Price, Joshua claimed that he was far less dedicated at the time and had spent the night in jail just days before the sparring session.
“With David Price, I came out of a police cell the day before and went up there to spar,” Joshua said. “Price is a puncher and that was down to a lack of experience.”
