By Joe Hughes
WHAT a win for Daniel Dubois last weekend vs Anthony Joshua. Many picked Dubois to lose the fight, myself included, but he was dominant from the first round until the finish in the fifth.
He puts himself near the top of the division as the IBF world champion and with a win over one of the top heavyweights of the past decade or so. Next for him could be a big money rematch against Joshua, a rematch over past conqueror and world number one Oleksandr Usyk or even a match versus former champion and fellow Brit Tyson Fury, depending on what happens on December 21. Whatever is next for him, he sits in a great position and is possibly not at his peak.
We’ve seen a changing of the guard in the heaviest division in boxing over the last couple of years. There was a period of time where Joshua, Tyson Fury and Deontay Wilder were most people’s pick of the top three. Fury drew with and then beat Wilder, Joshua and Fury were then both bested by the brilliant Usyk, Fury has the chance to avenge his loss later in the year but will this time go into the match as a big underdog.
The Ukrainian unified the division and although he is no longer the undisputed champion in terms of holding all four of the major belts, he’s still the number one and the only man with a legitimate claim to the throne. Whoever wins Usyk-Fury II will most likely be called upon to face Dubois next and so the cycle continues.
Joe Hughes (Getty Images)
We (Paddy John’s ABC) had our home show on Saturday. It actually went relatively smoothly for once. We had a successful night, our boxers were involved in nine matchups. One was a skills bout, so no winner. Then we had seven wins against only one reverse. In amateur boxing anything over 50/50 is usually a good result so I was very pleased with it. It’s the first time I’ve cornered boxers since last December; it was good to be back at it.