Anthony Joshua sparring partner Joey Dawejko 'received death threats' amid rumours he KO'd Brit star before shock Andy Ruiz Jr loss
ANTHONY JOSHUA'S former sparring partner Joey Dawejko has revealed he received death threats amid rumours he KO'd the Brit in sparring.
Following Joshua's sensational defeat to huge outsider Andy Ruiz Jr, the world began to speculate reasons for one of the biggest shocks ever in boxing.
Ruiz picked up the WBA, IBF and WBO world heavyweight titles putting his name amongst the top names in the division.
One of the rumours to come out was that AJ had been hammered in sparring – with Dawejko said to be the man responsible.
Promoter Eddie Hearn quickly rubbished that rumour and while not going into detail about the training, Dawejko said things took an ugly turn.
Speaking to FightHype.com, the 29-year-old Pennsylvania bruiser said: "Man I was getting death threats and everything on my Instagram for that.
“People are saying that I said this and I said that… I never said nothing and honestly I don’t want nothing to do with it anymore.
I’ll never speak about sparring. That’s a boxing brotherhood thing
“Me and Anthony Joshua are cool, we were friends in camp and that’s where it stays, I hope he sees that and we’re on the same page.
“I respect Anthony Joshua so much, I’m not going to talk about nothing, no sparring stories. I was never that type of fighter.
"I was in camp with a lot of people, a lot of heavyweight champions, I’ll never speak about sparring. That’s a boxing brotherhood thing. I’ll never talk about that.
"People are coming out on the internet saying that I said that. I don’t even want to talk about it. It’s annoying."
Just days after Joshua fell to his first professional defeat to Ruiz at the world-famous Madison Square Garden, Dawejko was handed arguably his biggest fight to date.
GASSIEV NEXT FOR DAWEJKO
On July 27, he will fight Murat Gassiev who is stepping up to heavyweight from cruiserweight.
Gassiev has only lost one fight, against Oleksandr Usyk, and has 19 KOs from 26 wins.
Dawejko brings to the ring a pretty average fight record of 19 wins, seven defeats and four draws.
But Dawejko has denied that he has landed this shot because of the fallout of the Joshuo KO rumour.
He added: “Listen, there’s a lot of stuff going on about me right now, when I was in camp with Anthony Joshua and everything.
“People have this conspiracy theory that what happened in camp, Eddie Hearn gave me an offer to fight Gassiev like he’s throwing me a bone or something.
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“But that’s not the case. I got offered that fight back in May and I was supposed to fight him and that was way before the Joshua camp. I hope people see this video and realise that.
“I was already offered that fight back in May then something happened and it got pushed back to July. It’s not true."
Meanwhile, Joshua is set for his rematch against Ruiz in November or December.
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