Anthony Joshua and fellow Briton Daniel Dubois will fight for the IBF heavyweight belt on September 1 at Wembley Stadium after Oleksandr Usyk was forced to relinquish the belt.
The London event is the first Saudi Arabian-backed promotion in the UK since the Middle East state began its heavy involvement in boxing.
With Usyk set to fight Tyson Fury in a rematch in December, the Ukrainian was forced to vacate his IBF belt just five weeks after becoming the first man in 25 years to be crowned undisputed heavyweight champion with a split-decision victory over the Briton in Riyadh.
Usyk’s mandatory IBF title defence against challenger Filip Hrgovic was left pending and 26-year-old Dubois became the new interim IBF heavyweight champion by beating the Croatian earlier this month.
Dubois and Joshua met face-to-face at a press conference on Wednesday and had to be separated by security while they prepared for filming of the TV series The Gloves Are Off. Dubois insisted that the animosity was genuine and that he was “ready to go” while Joshua, already a two-time heavyweight champion, said he would save his fire for the night of the contest.
“This is my time and I’m taking over,” said Dubois, who, at 26, is eight years younger than Joshua. “He has been a target for me for a long time, and this fight is not going to last 12 rounds. There was no handshake behind the scenes, we’ll do that when I’ve defeated him.”
Usyk, in a social media message, said that giving up his IBF belt would be “my present” to clear the way for Dubois and Joshua to fight for the crown. The Ukrainian, who is still the WBO, WBA and WBC champion, has beaten Joshua twice and Dubois once.
The relinquishing by Usyk of one of the belts so soon after his unification victory demonstrates the pitfalls faced by a multi-belt world champion. Unfortunately, with how the sport has evolved, four possible world champions in each weight division precludes an undisputed champion from reigning for long before the belts are split off due to mandated challengers.
The previous undisputed heavyweight champion was Britain’s Lennox Lewis, who defeated Evander Holyfield to claim the tag in 1999. He was also stripped of belts during his reign. In 2000, the WBA took away its belt when Lewis chose to face Michael Grant instead of mandatory challenger John Ruiz. Two years later, the IBF followed suit because Lewis did not face mandatory challenger Chris Byrd.
In the four-belt era, it is nigh on impossible to satisfy all the demands of the sanctioning bodies.
The 37-year-old Usyk had put in a request to retain the IBF belt until December 21, to make his expected rematch with Fury another battle for the undisputed title. However, IBF rules meant Usyk would have been stripped of its belt unless he fought Dubois.
Oleksandr Usyk needed help lifting all four world heavyweight title belts after beating Tyson Fury last month – but now has one fewer to carry – AP/Francisco Seco
While this seems unjust to Usyk, it is a big bonus for British sports fans who will witness Joshua attempting to become a three-time world heavyweight champion against his compatriot before an expected 90,000-capacity crowd.
Joshua is coming off two stoppage victories, both in Saudi Arabia, against Otto Wallin, and the MMA heavyweight Francis Ngannou, and he could not resist a dig at Tyson Fury.
“I’m glad Fury is not undisputed,” said Joshua. “Fury is an idiot, I’ve said it before. He’s very disrespectful. He disrespected Usyk before they fought, calling him names. I’m here to put a good name on boxing, to carry myself in a certain way.”
For Joshua, Wembley Stadium holds great memories, given his incredible fight with Wladimir Klitschko in April 2017, and it is evident the 34-year-old is desperate to join the likes of Muhammad Ali as a three-time heavyweight champion of the world.
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