OPINION: It was an epic night of surprises. Dr Steelhamer [Wladimir Klitschko] walking out to 'Can't Stop' by the Red Hot Chili Peppers; Anthony Joshua standing in front of a pyrotechnic display of AJ on the one night when he needed to be 100 percent focused on the impending war; Klitschko bouncing around like a spring chicken; and a fight that delivered perhaps the most electric night of heavyweight boxing in the last 40 years. Can you recall a better one?
What was obvious from round one was WK's remarkable sharpness. The head movement, the feints, the unbelievable lightness of bounce - where was this coming from? And it shocked the 27-year-old Brit. The first few rounds were difficult to split, but the Ukrainian gained the slight upper-hand in the fourth. And then came the fifth and sixth rounds.
I don't have the editorial space to do justice to these monumental minutes. Klitschko went down first, after a blurring, blistering cacophony of punches from Joshua. I predicted the fight would end in the fifth. But the old man got up, hung on and lived to punch another round.
And what a round it was, with the legendary 41-year-old, who looked pitiful against Tyson Fury, putting Joshua on his backside with a right hand, set up by a distracting left - his trademark combo. The record crowd of 90,000 was completely stunned, while AJ's promoter Eddie Hearn looked like his head was about to explode, as his golden egg began to crack under the pressure.
But the shocks kept on coming. Joshua showed he has the heart of a lion. He got back up, hung on and tried to work the jab. The next three rounds were cat and mouse, with the occasional audible gasps from the watching, baying mob - the pair exchanged, out of fear, respect, desperation and the promise of maybe a billion dollars further down the track (for AJ anyway). So, plenty at stake then?
The dramatic denouement eventually came in the 11th, when a ground-shaking Joshua uppercut landed like a vertically-launched rocket on Klitschko's chin. Of course he was going to get back up - not once, but twice. And while the referee probably gave him too much time to recover (although David Fields was otherwise excellent), a third barrage was too much and he spared the Ukrainian any more punishment. AJ merely smiled and strode back to the inevitable ensuing chaos.
Joshua's post-fight words were gracious, as they often are. "What can I say. I'm not perfect, but I'm trying." But AJ is doing more than that. He's bringing back to life a sport supposedly on its knees, littered with fight cancellations, hype jobs and confusion over who holds which belt.
Just for the record, Joshua now has the WBA belt along with the IBF. A certain Kiwi fighter has one of the other two, while Deontay Wilder holds the WBC.
He was ringside in London and said a clash with Joshua could be in front of more than 90,000, that may be true, but it's unlikely any fight will ever hit the heights of April 29.
Alex Bell is a former sports producer for The AM Show.
