The war of words between former champion Tony Bellew and Daniel Dubois’s coach Don Charles has been ramped up a level once again.
Bellew started this online beef by accusing Dubois of being a quitter, and he was not the only one. The first time came after Dubois took a knee following sustained damage to his eye socket when fighting Joe Joyce back in November 2020.
‘DDD” got back to winning ways but then appeared to go down easily after a solid jab from Oleksandr Usyk in their first fight in August 2023.
Since then, Dubois has shown plenty of heart to KO Anthony Joshua, Jarrell Miller, Filip Hrgovic and most recently Fabio Wardley to regain the IBF world tile and make himself a two-time world champion.
Speaking to FightLens, Bellew responded to Charles who clapped back with his own accusation that Bellew quit in his world title fight with Adonis Stevenson in November 2013.
“I seen Don Charles’s clip and words about me so first of all, I’ll address the Don Charles thing. Don, sad really, it’s not personal, but if you want to make it personal, I’ll make it personal.
“First of all, I very much crashed weight, I’m a 12stone 7lbs fighter, you know the size of me, you’ve been in and around my company many times, but I get beat by the better man, I get hit so hard I’m standing up and I’m out on my feet.
Another question Don, you’ve seen me climb off the floor numerous times to heavy, heavy punches. Face first knockdowns to Ovill McKenzie, dropped heavily in my world title fight with Ilunga Makabu, fighters with severe knockout ratios, I climb up,
“Don. You’ve seen me on the floor in a worse position than your man, Oleksandr Usyk, flat on my back, I’m up at the count of eight, asking to fight on. I’m looking at the clouds because I don’t know where I am. Your man stays on his backside, watches and counts to 10, then jumps up and walks back to his corner.”
For many people, Dubois has now long since proven he is no quitter. Next up for him is a rematch with Wardley later this year.
