Eddie Hearn left red-faced over Daniel Dubois comments as Anthony Joshua fights collapse

Boxing promoter Eddie Hearn has seen his plans for Anthony Joshua's future disrupted after Daniel Dubois pulled off an audacious upset against Filip Hrgovic. Hearn's comments claiming just hours before the fight that Dubois is "not an elite heavyweight" were thrown back in his face after the Briton's stoppage of Croat contender Hrgovic, while a potential bout between Joshua and Deontay Wilder also now looks impossible.

The Bronze Bomber suffered his fourth defeat in five fights after a one-sided fifth-round knockout at the hands of Zhilei Zhang. The pair clashed as Queensberry Promotions cleaned house in their 5v5 tournament against Matchroom Sport on Saturday, forcing Hearn to have a major reshuffle of his immediate plans for Joshua.

During his appearance on the True Geordie podcast, the Matchroom boss said: "I thought to myself, 'Who are we gonna make captain? Who's the biggest name on the team? Who's gonna go last? Who can give us drama like no-one else can? Who can spin this narrative even further that, not just is Wilder in the team, he's the captain of the team.'

"Because I've gotta pump Wilder up, y'know? Because you can become deflated in this game real quick - well, even in life. All of a sudden you don't think you're the man anymore. And I get into him, I pump him up, and I make him that bad motherf****r once again. And I want him to go in there and knock Zhilei Zhang spark out on double points to maybe even come from behind and win the whole tournament."

In actuality, almost the opposite ended up materialising in Riyadh as the Queensberry clan completed a 10-0 clean sweep over Hearn's Matchroom mob. Zhang, Dubois and Hamzah Sheeraz played key roles in that result as they each collected knockout victories to further boost their points tally on the night.

Needless to say, that's not how Hearn expected things to pan out, particularly in regards to Dubois' dominant performance against Hrgovic. Hearn's pre-fight comments suggested that was one matchup in which he was particularly confident of his fighter's chances, dismissing Dubois as a top-tier talent in his assessment.

"People have talked about Hrgovic for a long time as an elite heavyweight" he said. "But the biggest win in his career is Zhang in a fight that could have gone either way. His mother passed away a couple of weeks before - I don't think he was 100% - but looks at Dubois.

"He just beat Jarrell Miller - decent. He fought [Oleksandr] Usyk and had him over in a marginal [low blow]. It could have gone the other way and he beats Oleksandr Usyk. He boxed Joe Joyce. He's been around now, Dubois. But I do think Hrgovic is an elite heavyweight, and I don't think Dubois is."

Put that down as another piece of Hearn analysis that proved wide of the mark as Dubois left Hrgovic a bloody mess to claim the interim IBF title. The referee waved off the bout with Hrgovic on his stool heading into the eighth round, marking the biggest win of Dynamite's career to date and likely changing Hearn's perception of his talents in the process.

The promoter went on to say it was likely the winner between Hrgovic and Dubois would go on to face Joshua for the vacant IBF title in September. He added the caveat that AJ could fight Wilder if he performed well against Zhang, though his paltry display means that fixture also looks dead in the water.

"If Deontay Wilder knocks out Zhilei Zhang, and his excellency says, 'That fight is back,'" added Hearn in remarks that have already aged badly. "Don't forget, that fight was signed. We were suppsed to announce that fight in the ring on December 23. If he looks sensational against Zhang, the whole world's gonna be calling for Wilder against Joshua again. And we can do that at Wembley."

With fights against Wilder and Hrgovic now out of the question, AJ will likely face off against Dubois in a Battle of Britain, though Zhang will hope he too can land a fight with Hearn's star man.