Daniel Dubois Stuns Anthony Joshua in Heavyweight Upset
In an exciting turn of events, Daniel Dubois scored an upset victory over Anthony Joshua, former unified champion, and retained his IBF heavyweight world title, in what was his first title defense. The match happened Saturday night in London, where Dubois dominated over Joshua, managing to score knockdowns in the first, third, fourth, and fifth rounds before Joshua was eventually counted out.
This victory proved particularly impressive for Dubois considering his KO loss against Oleksandr Usyk only a year ago. However, since then, Dubois appears to have been on a roll, with KO victories over Jarrell Miller, Filip Hrgovic, and now Joshua.
Despite being considered an underdog with odds of +330 by ESPN BET, Dubois took the fight to Joshua right from Round 1. Joshua was not a significant threat to Dubois throughout the match, with the exception of a well-placed right hand which put Dubois in trouble in Round 5, right before Dubois scored the KO punch.
This was the second fight where Joshua was knocked down four times, the first occurrence being in his fight against Andy Ruiz Jr., where he suffered a seventh-round TKO loss in 2019. Meanwhile, with this victory, Dubois climbed three spots in the heavyweight division, ranking at No. 3, pushing Joshua down two places to No. 5.
On the same fight card, Hamzah Sheeraz managed to secure a second-round KO against Tyler Denny, allowing him to retain his No. 6 spot in the middleweight division. Simultaneously, Joshua Buatsi triumphed over Willy Hutchinson by split decision, securing the WBO interim light heavyweight title.
Over in Glendale, Arizona, on Friday, Jaime Munguia made a successful return to the ring after his first career loss by unanimous decision to Canelo Alvarez back in May. The super middleweight boxer defeated Erik Bazinyan with a 10th-round KO, in an impressively strong performance against an opponent who had never been knocked down or silenced in his career thus far. As a result, Munguia retained his No. 3 ranking in the 168-pound division, while Bazinyan dropped one spot to No. 10.
