Joshua and Dubois battle behind the true champion

BN columnist Joe Hughes discusses the big fight tonight.

DANIEL Dubois and Anthony Joshua face off tonight with the IBF version of the heavyweight championship of the world on the line. For me, it detracts a bit from the fight that the title has been attached to it when everyone knows Oleksander Usyk is the true champion and has beaten both men without a reverse. 

Boxing has a tendency to shoot itself in the foot, and I feel this is another example of it. We finally had an undisputed heavyweight champion of the world, and we lost it before the champion had a chance to step back in the ring.

I think the fight itself will be entertaining while it lasts but Joshua will win within the first half. Dubois will be dangerous but I think Joshua will be too good on the night. Daniel was relatively easy to hit with the straight right versus Hrgovic in his last outing and if that is the case this weekend, it could be a short night. 

Joshua, however, will have to be very careful defensively himself as Dubois’s undoubted power has the potential to cause an upset. If Dubois were to win, I don’t think it would be as big of an upset as when Joshua lost to Andy Ruiz back in 2019, so it’s definitely a real possibility. 

The talk of Dubois hurting Joshua in sparring previously adds a bit of spice to the build-up but sparring and fighting are two very different things and I don’t think it’ll have an effect on the fight.

The Riyadh season card at Wembley isn’t the only show this Saturday I’ll be paying attention to. The club I coach at, Paddy John’s ABC, also has its first show of the season. We have nine of our own boxers competing on it at the moment and it’s the first show we’ve done since last December. 

It’ll be good to get back in a boxing ring, especially considering the fact I won’t be the one getting punched in the face. We have a few boxers making their debuts on the show, a few experienced lads and a few that have come from other clubs, having their first matches with us. 

It’s been pretty stressful doing the matchmaking, and I’ve been unable to match a few of our boxers that I’d have liked to, but it’s not been the hardest show to match compared to the ones I’ve done in the past. There may not be as many eyeballs watching it, but without these grassroots amateur shows, we would never see the huge stadium ones.