Heavyweight boxing champ Anthony Joshua was released from a Nigerian hospital New Year’s Eve and immediately paid tribute to his trainers who were killed in the highway crash that put him there.
Doctors said Joshua was okay to recover at home as authorities pondered charging the driver of the SUV they were riding in Monday when it slammed full speed into a truck stopped in the road.
Joshua was “heavyhearted and full of emotions over the loss of his two close friends” when he left the hospital late Wednesday afternoon, the governments of Lagos and Ogun states said on X.
Joshua’s strength and conditioning coach, Sina Ghami, and trainer Latif “Latz” Ayodele both died in the crash.
“Anthony and his mother were at the funeral home in Lagos this afternoon to pay their final respects to his two departed friends as they were being prepared for repatriation scheduled for later this evening,” Lagos state spokesperson Gbenga Omotoso wrote in the governments’ statement.
Joshua, 36, had been hospitalized for observation with minor injuries, officials said. He was in the backseat of a Lexus SUV that was ferrying the three men from Lagos to Sagamu along the busy Lagos-Ibadan Expressway in Makun, Ogun State, when a tire burst and sent the out-of-control vehicle careening into the truck, officials said.
The driver, who also survived, “could be prosecuted for reckless driving,” a police official told Nigerian newspaper The Guardian, according to Agence France-Presse.
Ghami and Ayodele were pronounced dead at the scene, Police Commander Babatunde Akinbiyi of Nigeria’s Traffic Compliance and Enforcement Corps (TRACE) told BBC News.
The men were “two of Joshua’s closest friends” in addition to being “massive parts of the Anthony Joshua machine,” boxing expert Steve Bunce told BBC Radio 5 Live. “They’ve been with him, if not from the start, at least very early on. They are with him all the time.”
Condolences poured in for all three.
“Rest in peace Latz and Sina,” wrote Eddie Hearn of Matchroom Boxing in an Instagram post alongside a photo of the three men. “Your energy and loyalty among so many other great qualities will be deeply missed. Praying for strength and guidance for all their family, friends and of course AJ during this very difficult time.”
