Deontay Wilder is 'already plotting' a comeback despite his devastating defeat to Tyson Fury at the T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas.
The Bronze Bomber, 35, was brutally knocked out in the eleventh round of the main event at The Park in their long-awaited trilogy fight in Sin City.
It marked the final fight of their three-part series and even Fury's wife Paris has urged the American to walk away from boxing.
Wilder has now lost two of his last three fights in the ring, with both of those defeats coming inside the distance.
But it seems he isn't prepared to give up quite just yet as his trainer Malik Scott shut down any talk of him hanging up his gloves.
Scott told World Boxing News: “I planned on not talking about boxing with him, but Deontay is such a warrior, such a natural fighter, that he’s already plotting and planning the same way he did after the [second] fight against Fury.
“His whole thing is to get right back, and my whole thing is I’m telling him is not only should you rest, it’s a deserved rest.
“After the fight, I kept telling people Deontay’s gonna rest. I don’t want to talk about boxing with him, and I’m not even going to bring boxing up.
"But after the fight, I’d call him like 2-3 in the morning, wake him up and talk to him about new drills I have for him, new stuff we have to work on.
"I’m like, ‘Bro, I got these drills, we gonna do this when we get back. You’re gonna be two-time heavyweight champion. It just didn’t happen for us on the night, but, bro, you won a whole lot of glory.’
“I said I wouldn’t talk to him about boxing for a bit, and then the minute I go look at the fight, I call him immediately with no consideration for the time. We laughed about it.”
Wilder's return has been slated for May later next year, although that's entirely dependent on him recovering from injury.
The 35-year-old recently underwent surgery on his injured right hand which is his main weapon of choice.
But he is expected to make a full recovery with a view to fighting by the summer of 2022 and again before the end of the year.
Scott added: “We should be back in camp, in my opinion, no later than March and fight in May. Or we may be back in camp before March. It all depends on how he recovers, how he’s feeling, how everything’s going.
“With Deontay, obviously, the first fight back is not going to be at the level that he just left. We have to do things the right way.
“But at the same time, we can’t go much lower than that because he’s a high entertainment revenue fighter. He’s big-time boxing. We have to give him a threat because Deontay gets up for threats.
“Obviously, it won’t be a Fury level, but it won’t be somebody down in the bucket. We’re not going to get somebody with a record of 27-11. That’s not happening. It has to be a name that fans have heard of.”
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