Oleksandr Usyk delivers TKO win against Daniel Dubois in the 10th-round, after a suffering a controversial low-blow in the 5th-round.
Firstly, Usyk had clearly won most of the rounds, before achieving a TKO win in the 9th-round.
After additional scrutiny, I rescinded my previous position, and agree with the referee that it was a low-blow.
The knuckle part of the glove had made contact with the beltline, but part of the glove also landed below the beltline.
Usyk started well behind the jab at mid-range, negating Dubois’ offence early. Dubois did have success with body-shots in the fight, and also the right-hand.
Dubois had buzzed Usyk at the end of the 7th-round, with Usyk going back to boxing after this point.
For me, Usyk was clearly the better boxer all-round, demonstrating superior hand-speed, punch-technique, speed etc.
However, Usyk did also make more mistakes with his punches than he did in previous fights, over-committing with the left-hand and missing was a key mistake here. Dubois could have capitalised on this by throwing more right-hands.
right-uppercuts are perfect against poorly timed, poorly placed left-hooks.
Dubois isn’t world-level, I don’t see him beating the top-5 heavyweights at this time, but should be competitive with the top-15.
Finally, Usyk should be going on to fight either Hrgovic, or Fury, depending on whether Frank Warren is successfully able to appeal the result of this fight.
Personally, I do not think Frank Warren has a case with the evidence that has been presented. But we shall what happens going ahead.
