Let us pause for thought, AJ is not yet Ali reincarnated

IF Anthony Joshua had a pound for every time it has been said he will be boxing’s first billionaire, he would already be boxing’s first billionaire. And that is not all.

If you breathe deeply enough of the hype surrounding him after his entertaining 11-round win over Wladimir Klitschko, then he is already the most marketable British sportsman alive, the future of boxing and the reincarnation of Muhammad Ali (below).

Well, we’ll see. Certainly Joshua and Klitschko gave 90,000 people at Wembley and a record pay-per-view audience their money’s worth on Saturday.

Their styles were perfectly matched for a trip to hell and back and until the moment that Klitschko wilted in the penultimate round, all results were still possible.

In the end, age and stamina decided the fight. At 41 Klitschko had a second wind, which carried him past his fifthround knockdown into the championship stanzas.

The trouble was, at 27, Joshua had a third wind, and he used it to blow the Ukrainian away.

Let us not doubt that Klitschko is an all-time great, deserving to be ranked somewhere in the all-time heavyweight top 10.

Less certain is where Joshua will end up. At 19-0, with three world heavyweight belts, he has completed the first stage of his ride from Olym Olympic hero to professional cha champion. What will determin determine his legacy is what he d does in his next 20 fights. B But if anyone dares say forf certain what tha that will be, they are eith either a gambler oor a fool. If JoshJoshua really does wantw three commascomm on his bank bbalance and a hall-offamefam reputationrep aftera we’re all dead, thent he mustm dealde with two sizablsizable obstacles. Three if you count Tyson Fury. The first obstacle is his boxing. Joshua is good but he isn’t Mike Tyson in 1986, let alone Ali in 1966 when, as Cassius Clay, he beat Cleveland Williams in three rounds during which Williams barely landed a single punch. Joshua fought well in patches against Klitschko, with bags of heart and power, is a smart guy and will improve.

So the bigger obstacle to his success is the poverty of the heavyweight pool.

How many opponents can he find to do the Klitschko-level numbers his brand now demands?

Kubrat Pulev and Luis Ortiz are hardly names to make you go ooh, for all that they are the mandatory IBF and WBA challengers. You can add WBO champion Joseph Parker to the list of decent fighters the British public have never heard of. David Haye, Tony Bellew, Hughie Fury and Dillian Whyte are possibilities but they are domestic shows, not international superbouts.

In other words, heavyweight boxing is a jungle with few rumbles. By my reckoning there are only three options that will justify the new level of AJ hype: a Klitschko rematch, a Las Vegas fight against Deontay Wilder and the showdown with Fury.

Which is the third problem. Fury is fat, banned and depressed, with a doping hearing coming. He talks on Twitter of a comeback but talking on Twitter is really all he does these days.

You can’t fight a man who isn’t fighting.

Yet it’s worth admitting that, whether you like him or not, Fury’s reputation was also enhanced by Saturday’s fun.

His ugly, turn-off of a win over Klitschko in 2015 was achieved with much less trouble than Joshua required and a fit and focused Fury would give Joshua a harder night than Wladimir did.

Which leaves us — where? With an exciting new British world champion, hyped to the rafters, so all power to a decent and ambitious young man.

But let’s wait and see where he goes next before we start counting those billions.