“It’s definitely the biggest fight of my life,” Daniel Dubois says of his world heavyweight title unification bout against Oleksandr Usyk at Wembley Stadium on Saturday night before, following a slightly deflated pause, he highlights an unusually downbeat buildup. “It’s strange but it feels like it’s been going under the cover, like it hasn’t been really hyped‑up as I would have thought a unification fight will be. But maybe that will pick up on the night.”
Sitting in the July sunshine outside his gym in Borehamwood, with the Wembley arch clearly visible through the haze of heat, Dubois looks a little hurt when I ask if he can explain why there has been such limited fanfare around an interesting rematch between two contrasting heavyweights who own all the world titles between them. “I’m not sure,” Dubois says in his role as the IBF champion. He then laughs ruefully.
