Boxing fans are eagerly anticipating who Anthony Joshua will fight first in 2018.

The British fighter has the heavyweight division at his feet after a scintillating 2017 that saw him send Wladimir Klitschko into retirement at Wembley and traverse the gruelling challenge of Carlos Takam and his iron chin.

Unification is now the prospect on everybody's tongue with Deontay Wilder and Joseph Parker holding the remaining heavyweight belts.

Negotiations for a Wilder bout are well underway but a number of complications remain. There's conflict over whether the fight should be held in the US or UK, how the purse will be divided and whether Dillian Whyte will be involved in any contract.

As a result, it seems a raid on the WBO title and stripping Parker of his unblemished record is the preferred option for the spring of 2018.

And the situation was no more exacerbated than by a bizarre press conference staged by Parker and his team on Tuesday night where they made a final offer as well as displaying a video showing Joshua getting 'dropped.'

By that they meant a slight wobble from AJ's amateur days, an anomalously threatening punch from Whyte and the Klitschko knockdown that every boxing fan has seen before.

The whole stunt was considered something of a farce and no more so than by AJ's promoter Eddie Hearn who laughed off the event in an interview with Sky Sports.

He hilariously remarked: "You've got to love this David Higgins - he is absolutely off his swede.

"We are getting closer on a deal, but holding a press conference in a broom cupboard with a promotional video that looks like it's been done by my eight-year-old daughter is not the one, in terms of justifying your commercial value."

Hearn didn't stop trolling his opposite number there, though, and went one step further with a crazy impression of Higgins and Parker with iFL Boxing.

Skip to 21:21 to see the brilliant back and forth:

Shrimps on the barbie? That would be the wrong country there, Eddie.

Nevertheless, questionable national stereotyping aside, Hearn puts on an entertaining impression and it's not hard to imagine even Parker being baffled by the makeshift press conference.

They'll have to put in a little more effort to warrant the percentage of the purse they're asking for at the moment, that's for sure.

He certainly won't be getting any extra revenue from footage of Joshua being dropped, anyway.

Do you think anybody in the heavyweight division can beat AJ right now? Have your say in the comments section below.