Anthony Joshua was knocked out in sparring before his shock defeat to Andy Ruiz Jr., according to reports.
The 29-year-old suffered the first loss of his career on Saturday evening as he was put down four times on the way to a seventh-round stoppage at Madison Square Garden.
Joshua and his promoter Eddie Hearn insisted after the fight that they were happy with the preparations and the training camp ahead of the contest against Ruiz, who has become the first Mexican heavyweight champion.
But according to World Boxing News, Joshua was hurt badly in a sparring session in the build-up to the fight after he was knocked out by Agit Kabayel.
Kabayel is the current European heavyweight champion whose record stands at 19-0.
The 26-year-old German was also one of Joshua’s sparring partners before his victory over Alexander Povetkin at Wembley last September.
Before the his defeat to Ruiz, Joshua was forced to dismiss claims that he had suffered an injury during sparring as he was seen with a large bruise and a cut on his face.
When asked about the injuries to his face, Joshua told Seconds Out: ‘Oh no, that was just physio stuff really.
‘No-one really does that to me in sparring and stuff like that. So that was just more physio stuff. But that’s it.’
Asked what he meant by ‘physio stuff’, Joshua replied: ‘Like rehabilitation, recovery.’
Hearn, however, is adamant that Joshua did not have a problem before the fight.
‘I’d like to tell you he [AJ] had a terrible camp, he wasn’t focused, but I didn’t see that. He worked very hard in training as he always does,’ Joshua’s promoter told talkSPORT.
‘I think it was a huge shock for everybody, AJ was probably the calmest person of everybody.
‘I even said to him today, ‘People said you didn’t look right.’
‘[He replied], ‘I was fine, I just got beat, I just got beat by the better man on the night, I got hit by a shot that I didn’t recover from and that’s it. Let’s go again, back to work.’’
