DANIEL DUBOIS could be a young man who is about to step into history.
If the 27-year-old Brit beats Ukrainian Oleksandr Usyk at a packed Wembley Stadium tonight, Dubois will become the undisputed heavyweight champion of the world.
GettyDaniel Dubois is vying to become the undisputed heavyweight champion of the world[/caption]
GettyBrit Dubois will take on Ukrainian Oleksandr Usyk at a packed Wembley Stadium[/caption]
And for once in boxing, all the hype is justified.
Tonight will be the first time ever that the undisputed heavyweight championship has been decided on British soil.
Dubois holds the IBF belt, but the rest — WBC, WBO, WBA — are in the lethal hands of Ukraine’s Usyk.
The winner takes all.
Once-a-century phenomenon
And if Dubois wins, he will immediately step into the hallowed realm of British boxing legends, right up there with Lennox Lewis, who became undisputed heavyweight champ by beating Evander Holyfield in 1999.
Before that, the last British boxer to hold the undisputed title was Bob Fitzsimmons in 1899.
An undisputed British heavyweight champion of the world is, it seems, a once-a-century phenomenon.
If Dubois wins. And that’s the big if. Usyk is the most formidable of opponents.
Unlike “Dynamite” Daniel Dubois — who has lost two fights, both in hugely controversial circumstances — the 38-year-old Ukrainian remains undefeated.
And Usyk has a record that shows he has fought and beaten more elite British fighters than any boxer since Muhammad Ali.
The 6ft 3in fighter — modestly sized for a heavyweight — has beaten Tyson Fury (twice), Anthony Joshua (twice), Derek Chisora and, between the Gypsy King and AJ fights, Dubois himself.
But during their fight in Poland in August 2023, Dubois — 6ft 5in and 18 stone of muscle, menace and spite — pushed Usyk far harder than he had ever been pushed before.
In the fifth round, Usyk collapsed to the canvas with a Dubois body shot to the lower abdomen that was controversially, some would say ludicrously, declared a low blow.
The fight was stopped for four minutes while Usyk recovered, and he went on to stop Daniel in the ninth round.
And while it is true that Usyk won well in the end, many feel that he should never have had the chance.
“I’ve been cheated out of victory tonight,” Dubois said at the time, and he had a point.
GettyUsyk stopped Daniel in the ninth round in their last fight[/caption]
Refer to CaptionDubois was once hailed as the future of British heavyweight boxing[/caption]
If he genuinely has no fear about facing the destroyer of so many British dreams, then that is because Dubois feels he has beaten his opponent once already.
At 27, Dynamite Daniel Dubois — Triple D — has already seen it all.
At the peak of his fighting prime, the softly spoken South Londoner has been battle-hardened in ways few other fighters ever experience.
“He has been through his trials and tribulations,” Lennox Lewis recently said of Dubois. “He’s the King Slayer.” Dubois knows what it is to be lionized, ridiculed, robbed blind and then lionized once more.
In his early twenties, he was the rising star of British boxing, claiming the vacant British heavyweight title in 2019 with a fifth-round knockout against Nathan Gorman.
Beating AJ in such devastating fashion showed the world one irrefutable fact: There is nothing wrong with Daniel Dubois’ heart.
Tony Parsons
Commentator Steve Bunce wrote: “Dubois fought like an old-seasoned bruiser, his feet flawless, his jab a stiff weapon inherited from the relics of the ring.”
Young and unbeaten, Dubois was hailed as the future of British heavyweight boxing until the strange night at the start of the pandemic, when he suffered his first defeat.
Joe Joyce, a decent but ageing fighter who Dubois was expected to walk through, shattered the orbital bone around Daniel’s left eye early in the fight, causing retinal bleeding.
Dubois took a knee in the tenth round and stayed down — possibly saving his eyesight, and probably his career.
But the backlash from fellow and former pro boxers for quitting a fight because he was in danger of losing his eyesight was vicious and merciless.
Top fighters who Dubois had hero worshipped tore him to shreds.
David Haye said that he would rather be “knocked sparked out” than ever quit.
�Mark Robinson Photography/MatchroomDubois did not simply beat Anthony Joshua, he destroyed him[/caption]
GettyDaniel with dad Dave, sister Caroline and brothers Prince, left, and Solomon in 2020[/caption]
Many feared Dubois would never recover from that defeat, because it called into question the one thing no boxer can have called into question — his heart.
But his greatest victory came in September last year. In front of 96,000 fans at Wembley Stadium, Dubois did not simply beat Anthony Joshua, he beat him up.
Daniel dropped British boxing’s former Golden Boy multiple times until he knocked him cold in round five.
You could sense the torch being passed from one generation to the next. It was the final act in the rehabilitation of Daniel Dubois.
Scar tissue
Beating AJ in such devastating fashion showed the world one irrefutable fact: There is nothing wrong with Daniel Dubois’ heart.
It is not too much to suggest the fighter has been preparing for this moment all his life.
He has never had a sip of alcohol. Never taken drugs. Doesn’t own a smart phone.
One of seven children, he was raised in a council flat in Deptford, South London, by a single father in a devout Christian household.
Dubois and his younger brothers and sisters were home-schooled by their ruthless market trader dad Stanley, doing press-ups on their closed fists in the front room while reciting Psalm 144, verse 1 from the Bible, the prayer of David, the Warrior King.
If Dubois wins, it will be one of those boxing nights that transcends the only sport that can never be called a game.
Tony Parsons
“Blessed be the Lord, my Rock, who trains my hands for war, my fingers for battle.”
This tough upbringing certainly worked for Daniel’s sister Caroline, too.
At 24, she is an undefeated world champ, holding the WBC and IBO lightweight belts.
Can her older brother grab the glory tonight?
Usyk is a truly great champion, and it is widely believed that he beat much bigger, stronger men — not least Tyson Fury, Joshua and Dubois himself — because he is ultimately a better boxer than all of them.
But Usyk is also 38. The world has already witnessed Daniel Dubois take Usyk to places the Gypsy King and AJ never managed to.
And only Father Time keeps his unbeaten record for ever.
Dubois remains what he has always been — a knockout artist, a virtuoso of the lights-out KO, defeating all but one of his 22 vanquished opponents by stoppage.
The Brit has, as they say, heavy hands.
He also has scar tissue from past trials and tribulations, inside and outside of the ring, that most fighters never know.
Being mocked after losing to Joyce, being robbed blind when he was beating Usyk in Poland — all of it has made him stronger.
If the Ukrainian champion is ever going to be beaten, the time is tonight, the place is Wembley.
Hero for the ages
And the man to beat him is a devout, clean-living young Londoner who styles himself Triple D.
Daniel Dubois is ready. He is one fight, one night — possibly one punch — from a truly historic victory, the kind of event that comes along every 100 years or so.
Holder of all the belts, rightful heir to a place in the sparsely populated pantheon of British heavyweighted heroes who have been undisputed champion of the world.
If Dubois wins, it will be one of those boxing nights that transcends the only sport that can never be called a game.
Do what no man has ever done — beat Usyk — and Daniel Dubois will be a British sporting hero for the ages, up there with Bobby Moore, Chris Hoy, Jessica Ennis-Hill, Lewis Hamilton, Andy Murray and Mo Farah.
Now that’s what I call undisputed.
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