Parker: I’ll be back,
Title out of reach but Parker vows . . .
Joseph Parker is eager to set up his next fight quickly as he looks to bounce back from the first loss of his professional career.
The 26-year-old lost his WBO belt to unified champion Anthony Joshua in Cardiff yesterday but made it clear he wants to start the rebuild with some urgency.
‘‘I want to set up another fight and come back strong,’’ Parker said. ‘‘We worked hard to get here, we all deserve a break to get home and spend time with our families.
‘‘Once that’s done and once we are relaxed, we want to set up another fight straight away, we have an awesome year ahead.
‘‘We are still young, we’ve still got lot of time. We fought good, he was the better man on the day. But we will be back. I have to take it on the chin.’’
Parker said he would be keen on getting in the ring with Joshua again at some stage but that doesn’t look likely any time soon.
Joshua made it clear WBC titleholder Deontay Wilder is his next target as he looks to add the final belt to his world title collection and become undisputed champion.
Parker’s promoter David Higgins believes his fighter is still a valuable commodity in the division and feels the UK is the most viable option to try to fast-track him back up the rankings.
Higgins said he was impressed with the way Parker was dealing with the defeat.
‘‘Some people get broken, he’s very philosophical,’’ Higgins said. The chins are up in our dressing room – there is not a funeral.
‘‘The UK fans and media respect Joseph for the way he fought and what he brought. So we will be back.
‘‘Eddie Hearn and I get on well. There will be an opportunity to speak to Eddie about matching Joseph against one of the other British heavyweights perhaps – the likes like Derek Chisora and Dillian Whyte . . . Tyson Fury if he’s getting fit.
‘‘The first thing to do is let Joseph relax, chill out and come to terms with it. We will have a chat to Joseph and see what he is thinking and then put the feelers out to Eddie Hearn and others.’’
Higgins felt being the first fighter to go the distance with Joshua and end his run of 20 consecutive knockouts needed to be acknowledged.
‘‘I don’t know what it would take to put Joseph down – he has still never been dropped,’’ he said of Parker’s game performance.
Higgins gave a vote of support for trainer Kevin Barry and the team to stay involved, believing they had laid the foundations.
‘‘There might be the odd chorus of commentators who will say ‘change your trainer, change your promoter, that’s your problem’.
‘‘But Joseph won’t be one of them because he knows that everyone did their best, including him.’’
Barry felt this wasn’t the right time to be talking about the next fight. ‘‘We just finished quite a big challenge. I’m pretty proud of this young man beside me.
‘‘Joseph is a long way from the finished product. There are a lot of things for him in improvement and development and we’ll see that in the next three or four years.’’