Usyk says he’ll give Dubois rematch in “street fight”

Image: Usyk says he'll give Dubois rematch in "street fight"
By Boxing News - 08/26/2023 - Comments

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By Jake Tiernan: IBF/WBA/WBO heavyweight champion Oleksandr Usyk jokingly said at the post-fight press conference tonight that he’ll give Daniel Dubois the rematch that he wants, but it’ll be a street fight tomorrow.

Usyk later dropped Dubois twice, once in round eight and another time in round nine, to get a ninth round TKO win on Saturday night at the Stadion Wroclaw in Wroclaw, Poland.

However, if the referee had ruled the fifth round body shot knockdown as legal, Dubois would have won the fight by knockout, and he’d be the new unified three-belt champion right now.

Usyk (21-0, 14 KOs) won’t be giving Dubois (19-2, 18 KOs) a rematch to clear up the controversy surrounding the fifth round knockdown that the referee Luis Pabon ruled was from a low blow.

The only way Dubois will get a rematch is if the appeal from his promoter results in it being ordered.

On replay, the right hand shot that the heavy-handed Dubois landed appeared to be a legal beltline punch that hit Usyk at the belly button level.

The referee gave Usyk a full five minutes to recover, and he appeared to be out of breath as if he’d had the wind knocked out of him rather than holding his groin in a classic example of someone hit low.

“I’m ready for rematch tomorrow in a street fight. I’m ready,” said Oleksandr Usyk at the post-fight press conference about Daniel Dubois. “Not boxing gloves, but a street fight.

Don Charles: “He legitimately got hit on the [belly] button and went down,” said trainer Charles about Usyk getting dropped in round five. “He actually thought about not continuing. That’s called faking it, and the referee fell for it.

“I trust Frank Warren that he’s going to lodge a complaint. I’m speechless. The fight ended in round [five].”

Frank Warren: “I said put it up on the big screen, and it went quiet. That’s all we needed to know. Everyone went quiet, and you could see what it was.”

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Charles: “We have such technology as VAR. They use it in football and tennis. Why not bring it in boxing to stop such things happening? If they only realize what people put into what they do. Usyk, I’m sure he put a lot of work into it to prepare himself.

“We put a lot into it. To be conned out of it. We should be sitting here with those belts. That young man [Dubois] should be going home with those belts, and I’m going to leave it to Frank Warren. We’re going to lodge a complaint. Yeah, it’s there to be seen.

“He always makes out that his opposition fighter hits him low. He does that in most of his fights. It’s a trick of his, and it should be stamped out. For a guy who pretends he doesn’t speak English, I understood everything he said,” said Charles about Usyk speaking with Dubois in his corner after the fight.

“He was speaking a lot of gibberish because he knows he conned the young man. ‘This is boxing, Daniel.’ We know it’s boxing, but we don’t like it when people cheat. That is cheating. There are no two ways about it.

“It’s like a footballer deliberately going down to get a penalty. There is no difference. My young fighter [Dubois] left this building distraught. God knows how that is going to affect his mind going forward. We put a lot into this. There are people’s lives on the line here.”

Warren: “No crybaby stuff. All we want is a fair shake, and we didn’t get it. What’s going to happen is what I said, and I’m very confident that once all the evidence is reviewed, they’ll either declare it a no-contest or order an immediate rematch.

“It would depend on who wins the purse bid,” said Warren when asked where he would stage the Usyk vs. Dubois 2 rematch if it’s ordered. “If we win the purse bid, absolutely,” said Warren about staging the rematch in London. “I’m going to put it on in my garden.”