Anthony Joshua has reacted to Tyson Fury’s most recent call outs of him on social media this week in boxing.

Fury has been on the verbal assault a lot on Joshua in recent times and promised the current heavyweight champion that if they fight in 2018, that it won’t go past eight rounds.

He’s also made jibes at Joshua referring to him as having worked for him in the past.

Joshua is no stranger to this type of banter and online trolling of course, and has reiterated in the past that he is more than willing to fight Fury when he returns to boxing.

Like the recent calls out from Deontay Wilder this past weekend elsewhere in the media, Joshua has taken his time to respond to Fury’s comments as well.

Speaking to Kugan Cassius of IFL TV, Joshua said:

“One side of me says he’s not relevant because he’s not fighting. With all due respect I can only speak about fighters who are active. But on the other side – I need Tyson Fury. I want him so I can compete with him. I want to challenge Tyson Fury.”

Fury is currently in the final process of awaiting the outcome of a hearing next month with UKAD and Joshua’s promoter Eddie Hearn is in the US at the moment – thought to be negotiating a possible Joshua vs Wilder heavyweight title unification fight in 2018.

Joshua last fought against Carlos Takam a couple of weeks ago when he scored a 10th round TKO to extend his professional boxing record to 20-0-20KO.

Fury’s current professional boxing record also still remains an unbeaten one at 25-0-18KO.

The pair are a little over one year apart in age. Fury turning 29 last August and Joshua having recently turned 28 last month.

So time is certainly on both of their sides in heavyweight boxing-terms – a fight that inevitably will happen one suspects.

For the full interview with Joshua on IFL TV YouTube (hat tip) check it out here: