JEFF POWELL: Anthony Joshua has relatively easy work ahead to return to a world title as he looks more like the old AJ… and now will he fight Tyson Fury or Oleksandr Usyk next winter?

Anthony Joshua turned back the years. Deontay Wilder rolled up the carpet.

The irony of big boxing is so complex that instead of pocketing a hundred million dollars with two sand-shoe shuffles with the broken Bronze Bomber, AJ is offered a shortcut to a third world heavyweight title.

Deep down – considering he already has ten times more millions in his bank account than the fifteen children Wilder and Tyson Fury fathered together – this might just be what Joshua prefers.

Ultimately, the legacy, the respect, the history and all that comes down to everything you put in the record books. Not how much is in your bank.

Had Wilder continued to prove he was the most lethal puncher since Iron Mike Tyson on Saturday night in Riyadh, instead of losing weakly to Kiwi Joseph Parker all 12 rounds, the desert sun would have risen over a very different landscape.

Now Wilder's two-fight contract is gathering dust in the Saudi kingdom as Joshua considers the prospect of meeting Filip Hrgovic for a vacant IBF world championship.

This particular sanctioning body is so contradictory that they are expected to strip the title from the winner of the February 17 fight between Fury and Oleksandr Usyk for the undisputed world heavyweight championship that boxing has been clamoring for for the past two decades.

While those two head back to Saudi Arabia for a rematch in the summer, the IBF will insist their mandatory challenger gets his chance.

Improve Croatian Hrgovic, who kept his nose clean on Saturday with an immediate stoppage of the hapless Australian autumn man Mark De Mori. Relatively easier work for Joshua now that he's got his mojo back.

No, Otto Wallin is no longer the same Swedish basher who once gave Fury a cut eye and a headache. But then again, Joshua was more like the old AJ who fought his way to Olympic gold and two world heavyweight titles.

The aggression that evaporated after being knocked out by Mexican roly-poly Andy Ruiz Jr. returned. As does the fluidity of the forward movement, the ramrod left thrust and the jerking rights. Most important of all, the confidence was that he powered his way through the first four rounds before referee Steve Gray and Wallin's cornermen agreed their man had taken enough punishment.

The trainers played an important role in the summit battles. Ben Davison lured Joshua out of his negative mindset and went to the front again. Andy Lee brought former world champion Parker not only back to title contention, but also to the best performance of his life.

It gives us all hope that the affable New Zealander has also benefited mentally from sharing a few Jagermeisters and invaluable sparring with his idol and friend Fury.

As for Wilder, after retreating to the ecological jungle of Costa Rica to taste the mystical powers of psychedelic drugs, he boxed as if he were still in a nirvana trance.

When he raised his arm at the last bell, as if expecting the gods to declare him triumphant, he was still gazing at the moon. Parker won each round with one official card, as well as mine and many others.

It was not until the twelfth that he made any attempt to land his right bazooka. Even then, his timing was so off that he couldn't have gotten himself out of a cobweb. Even rust after just 50 seconds in the ring, as his last stoppage time victory since the third of his wars with Fury, could explain this.

“Maybe I've found too much love in my life,” Wilder muttered as he hinted at retirement. He later retracted that, but whenever he returns to reality he will have to remember that at the age of 38, it is unlikely that he will ever be the same deadly fighting man again. Highly unlikely, we should perhaps say. For Wilder, the magic carpet ride appears to have become an emergency landing. For good.

With 2024 starting to look like the final year of the Golden Oldies – with Fury and Usyk fighting each other twice and perhaps the winner giving Joshua his hefty payday next winter – Daniel Dubois has found redemption just in time to be part of the succession.

Doubts arose about Dynamite Daniel's stomach during the most difficult match after his second knee drop, against Usyk, that demanded answers.

He provided that by beating up Jarrell Miller, the mountain of men almost as wide as he is tall, and then stopping this combative and previously undefeated American fighter just seconds before the end of the tenth and final round.

Criticism can sometimes be your best friend. A motivator that a reborn Joshua and a redeemed Dubois just witnessed.