By Jake Tiernan: Challenger Daniel Dubois says he’s studied a lot of IBF, IBO, WBA & WBO heavyweight champion Oleksandr Usyk’s past fights, and he’s ready to slow down his movement, cut off the ring to force him to brawl this Saturday night, August 26th at Tarczyński Arena Wrocław in Wroclaw, Poland.
The Usyk vs. Dubois event will be shown live on ESPN+ at 2:00 p.m. ET/11:00 a.m. PT.
Usyk (20-0, 13 KOs) is coming off back-to-back victories over former two-time heavyweight champion Anthony Joshua, and now he’ll be taking what many boxing fans feel is a more straightforward contest against the slow-moving behemoth Dubois (19-1, 18 KOs), who hasn’t proven himself yet against upper tier opposition during his six-year professional career.
DDD to follow old blueprint
Dubois & his trainer Don Charles have obviously studied Usyk’s fight against journeyman Derek Chisora from October 2020, and they’re likely to use that contest as the blueprint for how to defeat Oleksandr on Saturday.
Chisora put a lot of pressure on Usyk in that fight, plodding after him, throwing shots everywhere, and coming close to winning. The scores were 115-113, 115-113 & 117-112.
It’s unclear how motivated Usyk was for that fight because he sometimes fought like he was in a sparring session, knowing that he was in with an old journeyman fighter that should have retired years ago.
When Usyk did turn it up at times, it was embarrassingly easy for him, as he was hitting Chisora at will, and not fun to watch the old warhorse getting peppered with machine gun fire. In some ways, Dubois is like a bigger, equally slow version of Chisora and just as limited.
“I can see the benefit already. I’ve suffered with a lot of hard work,” said Daniel Dubois to Secondsout about his training at altitude for his fight this Saturday night against unified heavyweight champion Oleksandr Usyk in Poland.
“Every time I’m in the ring, I have to keep moving,” said Dubois about how he’s moving his head more for this training camp to prepare for Usyk. “It’s part of the game. For this level of boxing, you have every part covered.
“I needed to go through that fight with the way I did in the fashion I did,” Dubois said about his last contest against Kevin Lerena last December. “It’s about drama. That’s what boxing is. It’s entertainment. It’s money and entertainment. I’m sure we’ve got that part covered.
Is Dubois ready for Usyk?
“Performing on the night, that’s my main goal right now,” said Dubois about his focus for his fight with Usyk this Saturday night. “I’ve done all the southpaw sparring, so I know how to deal with it.”
Dubois has got to look world’s better than he did in his fights against Kevin Lerena & Joe Joyce for him to have any shot at beating Usyk on Saturday night.
If Dubois performs like that against Usyk, he’s going to be humiliated & exposed as just another one of the many British domestic-level heavyweights that can’t cut it against true world class competition.
Dubois’ best career wins:
- Kevin Lerena
- Trevor Bryan
- Joe Cusumano
- Bogdan Dinu
- Nathan Gorman
- Kyotaro Fujimoto
- Ebenezer Tetteh
That’s an embarrassingly bad bunch that Dubois has beaten, and it’s fair to say that he doesn’t rate a world title shot against Usyk with a resume that thin.
“Now, it’s all about finishing the job. Yes, loads of them,” Dubois said when asked if he’s studied video of Usyk’s past fights. “AJ, Chisora. I’ve picked certain parts from each fight. [Trainer] Don [Charles] is keeping me on top of it. It’s now fight time. Let’s get it on.
“Usyk is a cruiserweight. He’s smaller than me. It’s no secret that he moves around the ring a lot with quick feet. So we need to cut the ring off and cut him down, shut his pace down. Different things like that.
“At this weight and how I feel right now, it’s covered, I’m ready,” said Dubois.
