I had to cancel my family holiday to face Anthony Joshua on a week notice and my kids were fuming, says Robert Helenius
ROBERT HELENIUS faced the wrath of his children after cancelling their family holiday to fight Anthony Joshua on seven days notice.
The Swedish-born Finn has been subbed in for Saturday night in place of Dillian Whyte, who failed a drug test.
So father-of-three Helenius had to break it to his kids - aged 15, 13 and ten - that their vacation would have to wait.
He told SunSport: "They've been in this game a long time, the kids have been in this game since they were born.
"They don't know anything else. Of course they were sad, they wanted their holiday now! But life happens."
Helenius was in the form of his life after beating American prospect Adam Kownacki consecutively.
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It earned him a fight with Deontay Wilder last October but he was beaten after only 40 seconds and one right hand.
Helenius only returned last weekend, beating Mika Mielonen in a 15th-century three-tower CASTLE located in Savonlinna.
But he had little time to celebrate the win as immediately a shock offer was presented in his changing room.
Helenius, 39, revealed: "Five minutes after the fight my manager came to me and said, 'Do you want to fight Anthony Joshua next Saturday?'
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"I thought, 'Oh s***.' I'm still sweating, had my wraps on. I didn't know if I could fight. I said, 'Give me five minutes to think about this.'
"Then five minutes later I said, 'Let's do this. Let's do this.' This is what we do."
Helenius admits he has been left to consider retirement many times in his career but his wildcard shot at AJ gives him one last shot.
He said: "I don't know if this is the highest point in my career, it's up there.
"I've been boxing for a long time, I knocked out Samuel Peters, Lamon Brewster, Sergei Liakhovich back in the day.
"I knocked out Kowanacki a couple of fights before the Wilder fight.
"So I can't compare what one is the biggest, but this is up there of course. This is my opportunity to reclaim my dream."
Helenius knows he can change his life forever by upsetting Joshua's applecart and the magnitude of the moment is not missed on him.
He said: "When you have a really long thought about how your life is going and then it completely changes, for the better.
"I wasn't thinking about this at all, I thought it would probably take up to two years to get back to this point. But, now I'm here."
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