Oleksandr Usyk vs Anthony Joshua 2: AJ accused of being 'too nice'

Anthony Joshua has been accused of being ‘too nice’ ahead of his crunch rematch with Oleksandr Usyk.

That is the view of former cruiserweight world champion Johnny Nelson, who insists that ‘AJ let Usyk feel comfortable in his presence’.

Instead, the now Sky Sports pundit believes his fellow countryman needs to stop acting so friendly towards his opponent.

The pair’s rematch is currently scheduled for August 20 in Saudi Arabia at Jeddah’s Superdome.

Nelson told iFL TV: “I was surprised AJ let Usyk feel comfortable in his presence. If I was his people, I’d say, ‘Don’t do that, play that, don’t do that s**t.’

“You want to have this guy feeling uncomfortable around you. Even when the cameras aren’t around, don’t be having little selfies with him. Don’t be making this guy feel comfortable and doing that because when you’re comfortable, you produce cameos of brilliance.

“I’ve mentioned it before, fighting is mental warfare, and fights are won a long, long time before you get in the ring. You look at Roberto Duran against Sugar Ray Leonard for the first fight. He enraged him, he got under his skin and got him to box in a way that he didn’t want to box.

“He made Sugar Ray sleep, dream, eat him. When he got in the ring, his brain had gone. Sugar Ray learnt the lesson and came back six months later and outboxed him.

“Now, AJ has got to learn from this. I don’t want you to feel comfortable in my presence. I don’t want you to feel familiar around me. I want you to think, ‘S***, what’s going on here?’ I want you to be your every thought.

“I want you to think, ‘What am I going to bring different?’ When I make you feel comfortable like we’re cool friends and stuff like that, what’s on your mind? Usyk wants to pretend that we’re