Was it a low blow? Daniel Dubois believes so, Frank Warren thinks so, Oleksandr Usyk and his team disagree, nor do they feel it is their problem. Either way, the debate rages on.
It has emerged as one of the chief storylines in the build-up to July 19, when Usyk and Dubois will face off at Wembley Stadium for the right to be named the undisputed heavyweight champion of the world.
Usyk was victorious when the two fought in August 2023 as he knocked out Dubois in the ninth round before later going on to become undisputed champion against Tyson Fury in the first of back-to-back wins over the Gypsy King.
The fight came with controversy as Usyk was floored in the fifth round by what Dubois believed to be a legal body shot, only for it to be ruled a low blow by referee Luis Pabon.
Usyk was granted four minutes to recover, the Ukrainian going on to retain his WBA, WBO and IBO belts while Dubois was left furious with the decision.
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Daniel Dubois’ trainer Don Charles reacted to Oleksandr Usyk’s camp’s claims of low blows in their previous fight.
“Yeah, definitely (Usyk was looking for easy way out),” Dubois told Sky Sports.
“Many things. Not just that but that as well, a part of it. The body shot, they all said, there’s controversy but I need to clear up anyway.
“So that’s good, without a doubt I want to do that and at the same time do myself justice by nailing him to the canvas if I need to.”
Dubois and his team have since repeatedly insisted that it should have been ruled a legitimate body shot, the Londoner storming the ring after Usyk’s rematch victory over Fury to demand his shot at “revenge”. His wish was recently granted as he seeks to claim all four belts later this summer.
Trainer Don Charles was among the most vocal at this week’s announcement press conference when he accused Usyk of “conning” the referee and the boxing community, suggesting he “should have won an Oscar”.
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Oleksandr Usyk and Daniel Dubois had an intense stare-down during their face-off before their fight on July 19.
Promoter Frank Warren was also aggrieved by the decision and believes Dubois could have become the first man to beat the undefeated two-weight undisputed champion.
“It was on the shorts belt, which was on his navel, it’s not where the shorts are, it’s where the navel is, and you watch them, the punches, they were legitimate blows, and he got just under a four-minute break.
“By the way, I love Usyk – he’s a really good bloke, a great advert for boxing, he wanted to fight on and the referee said take more time. It threw him (Dubois).
“I said to Daniel afterwards, he was in the other guy’s backyard, sometimes they lean towards the home fighter, there was a massive Ukrainian presence, you’ve got to go in and do it.
“That four-minute break made the difference. I believe had that not happened he would have stopped him.”
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Oleksandr Usyk discusses Daniel Dubois’ low blow from their previous fight, the signal he made after he was pushed in their face-off and the potential to fight Tyson Fury for a third time, just for fun, if he returns to boxing
Both Dubois and Warren reflect on his loss to Usyk as something of a turning point having seen it spark a three-fight win streak over Jarrell Miller, Filip Hrgovic and Anthony Joshua, the latter by devastating knockout to become IBF world champion last September.
It hasn’t, though, deterred their sense of injustice regarding Dubois’ first fight against Usyk, whose manager Egis Klimas downplayed the incident while claiming his fighter would have been fine to continue had he been ordered to by the referee.
“If you’re going to go to jail, you’re going to come into jail, open the door, there are going to be 100 criminals sitting there, and you’re going to ask a question, ‘are any of you guilty?’ and 99 per cent are going to say ‘no, we’re not guilty, we didn’t do it’, but they did it,” Klimas told Sky Sports.
“So right now you’re asking Daniel, did you do a low blow? Of course he’s going to say no. His promoter, of course, is going to say no, but the truth is what it was.
“The referee, the one who is in the ring, he saw it completely, how it was done, and it’s not Oleksandr’s fault.
“I strongly believe if he were to start counting, Oleksandr would be on his feet on the eighth count, and he would continue, but because the referee gave him time, he took it, and he recovered.”
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Daniel Dubois believes Tyson Fury will ‘definitely’ come out of retirement and even teased a future fight with the Gypsy King.
Usyk marked the pair’s first press conference by asking Dubois to sign photographs of numerous ‘low blow’ shots he landed during their fight two years ago.
The 38-year-old instructed Dubois’ trainer Charles to teach his fighter how to punch ‘clean’.
“I live now, in the present,” Usyk told Sky Sports.
“For me it doesn’t matter what happened in the past, because it’s in the past. Bye, bye, thank you so much! You was great.
“This punch was bad, it’s not my problem, the referee made the decision.
“Daniel says ‘I won’, but you didn’t win. We have a new fight, it doesn’t matter.”
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Frank Warren says Daniel Dubois is ‘in a good place’ before his undisputed heavyweight rematch with Oleksandr Usyk.
If there are any chinks in the Usyk armour, then they are yet to reveal themselves with any clarity across a career in which he has reigned as undisputed champion at both cruiserweight and heavyweight while compiling a perfect 23-0 record that has seen him defeat four straight British fighters in the last five years.
Fury was unable to make enough of a meaningful dent to topple the pound-for-pound great, though did repeatedly allude to body shots as a route to success against Usyk.
If there is a weakness, Team Dubois believe it is there.
“Yeah body shots, Daniel caught him with a legitimate body shot and hurt him,” Warren continued.
“Egis made a telling point and said had the referee not called it a low blow then he would have got up before he reached the count of 10, but he took four minutes to get up, that’s the pain he was in.
“Daniel is a knockout artist and can hurt him, it will be a problem for Usyk, his body is his weakness.”
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Daniel Dubois says ‘he can do better’ than his fifth-round knockout performance against Anthony Joshua in his rematch with Oleksandr Usyk.
While it promises to be a frequent talking point, Warren told Sky Sports Dubois would not be distracted by incidents of the past as he seeks to become a four-belt undisputed champion.
“Daniel’s camp believed something different, as I did, that it was a legal blow,” Warren added.
“It doesn’t mean a thing, it’s happened, it’s in the past. What really matters is July 19, when history will be made, for the first time we have a heavyweight unification fight in the UK, it’s never happened with four belts in the UK.
“If Daniel can do what seven other British fighters haven’t been able to do against Usyk, he’s beaten them all, then he goes down in history, not just in boxing but sports history as the first Brit to hold all four belts.”
