WARRIOR ON THE BATTLEFIELD

You remain my power, my pleasure, my pain, baby
To me, you're like a growing addiction that I can't deny

Considering they put their lives on the line each time they fight, boxers really shouldn't be expected to deliver poetic statements before each fight but ever since the hyper lyrical Muhammed Ali became synonymous with memorable aphorisms in the 60s and 70s, it is an expectation nonetheless and so when the rare golden soundbite carries these days, it lands like a sweet overhand right.

Anthony Joshua, who fights Daniel Dubois later tonight at Wembley Stadium, had an unexpected moment of lucid eloquence yesterday at the weigh-in at Trafalgar Square, London when he was asked by interviewer Ariel Helwani if his current bout would be an opportunity for him to 'smell the roses' as a precursor to the imminent possibility of his retirement as each new heavyweight clash brings that inevitable day ever closer.

To which, Joshua replied - "I'm not a warrior in the garden yet. I'm still on the battlefield. I'm not smelling roses yet. Just blood, fresh blood."

Though Miyamoto Musashi in 'The Book Of Five Rings' once wrote, "It is better to be a warrior in a garden, than a gardener in a war," Joshua's pithy statement encompassed the poetic idea of holding back on a paradise garden where the two time heavyweight champion might soon happily reflect satisfactorily on the spoils of his historic battles in the squared circle. Instead, it reinforced his present commitment to the battlefield of the sport, proving that whatever happens tonight, Joshua still has a champion's heart.

The visual image of smelling a rose and smelling blood also proved to be a beautifully symbolic colour comparison from Joshua who is far better known for his fists than his words but who here, delivered a verbal knockout blow.

Let's see if Dubois will be sending Joshua to his garden of flowers later or whether it'll be his own crimson blood that spills on the battlefield canvas in Wembley Stadium.