Mike Tyson is a character who's certainly never too far away from the limelight, and he's recently just dropped a controversial opinion, as he doesn't include Anthony Joshua in his top five fighters.

According to Tyson, the current WBF, WBO, IBF and IBO heavyweight champion of the world falls just short, but the likes of Tyson Fury, Deontay Wilder and even Andy Ruiz Jr make the list.

Whilst discussing this current era of great fighters on his Hotboxin' podcast, Tyson reeled off a number of boxers he admires, but there was a clear, and fairly obvious, omission. 

"I respect Tyson Fury, I respect Deontay Wilder, I respect all of those guys," Iron Mike shared. 

"Andy Ruiz also, this guy named (Vasyl) Lomachenko - he's a f***ing animal, man. He's a master, it's like he's dancing.

"There's also Gervonta Davis, there's quite a few guys that are good fighters."

A now 54-year-old Tyson mentioned AJ's most recent opponent Andy Ruiz, who Joshua fought at the tail end of 2019 to reclaim his heavyweight title belts which he previously lost on his American debut. 

In addition to his comments regarding boxing's top fighters at the moment, Tyson went on to reveal his frustrations with professional boxing, which will likely resonate with many fan opinions. 

"The situation is whether they will fight each other. Promoters are not allowing them to fight each other. I’d love to see them fight each other but the promoters don't want to do it.

"It [boxing] is very political now. That's why I think in the next couple months or so you're going to find that there are some new players in the game and it's going to get really serious."

Anthony Joshua returns to the ring this weekend, as he looks to defend his heavyweight title belts against Kubrat Pulev, a 39-year-old Bulgarian fighter with 28 wins and just one defeat to his name.