A man with experience of facing Daniel Dubois in the squared circle has broken down his upcoming rematch with Oleksandr Usyk.
Dubois and Usyk first fought in August 2023. Dubois was still on the rise and had not yet found his best form. He put Usyk down in the fifth, however the referee stepped in and ruled it low before giving the champion all the time he needed to recover. The Ukrainian took back control and went on to stop Dubois inside nine rounds.
Since then, Dubois has improved and knocked out Jarrell Miller, Filip Hrgovic and Anthony Joshua to claim and defend the IBF title, which Usyk vacated.
Usyk has since twice beaten Tyson Fury and could well become a two-time undisputed champion if he beats Dubois again at Wembley in July.
Ahead of his fight with Lawrence Okolie on the same card, Kevin Lerena, who knocked down Dubois three times before losing by TKO when they fought back in December 2022, has been speaking to iFL TV and given his view on the contest.
“It’s a 50-50 fight. You might get that a lot, people saying it’s a 50-50. One is an extremely powerful concussive puncher. He’s got a good jab and he’s confidence is at an all-time high. And one is a magician, probably one of the greatest boxers, technicians of our era.
“If Daniel can’t hurt Oleksandr in the first 6-8 rounds, I think Usyk wins convincingly. But having said that, I think Daniel will be very dangerous for the first half of the fight. Not to say Daniel will fade, but I think Usyk becomes harder to fight once he finds his rhythm and his range, whereas Daniel is very dangerous earlier on. He can hit you and he can hurt you and he has a nice, authoritative jab. Usyk needs to take that away and utilise that to counter punch him, but it’s truly 50-50.”
