Lawrence Okolie believes that Daniel Dubois has an advantage in power over Anthony Joshua.
Dubois will defend his IBF heavyweight championship against Joshua at Wembley Stadium on September 21. Dubois may head into the contest as the champion, but it is Joshua who is the favourite to win.
Okolie knows them better than most after training alongside Dubois during their time under Shane McGuigan and having been a long-term sparring partner of Joshua during his time with Team GB. The former cruiserweight champion considers Joshua the likely winner of the fight to determine London’s leading heavyweight, but insists Dubois has the heavier hands.
“You know he will be a hard night’s work for ‘AJ’,” Okolie told Betway. “Daniel’s a young guy; full of ambition; made the most money he’s ever made and will be thinking, ‘If I win this fight, then there’s millions to be made on the other side of it’.
“It’s a hard one but AJ should be the favourite. But as they say, in heavyweight boxing, one shot can change everything and especially when you’re talking about someone as concussive as Daniel Dubois.
“Daniel is more heavy-handed. His hands are just naturally powerful if he lands, but AJ has speed power. He’ll be able to land a shot a lot quicker than Daniel Dubois. For example, let’s say Daniel is a 10 for punching power, AJ might be a nine, but AJ might be a nine for speed and Daniel might be a seven or eight, so it depends on what you like. You’ve got a mix of speed and power, so it makes it sharp and explosive and if it lands, we’ve seen what happens when Anthony Joshua lands with one shot clean.”
Dubois was eventually stopped by Oleksandr Usyk in his previous world heavyweight title fight but he has since impressed by stopping both Jarrell Miller and Filip Hrgovic, when both represented career-best wins.
“One thing you don’t want is Daniel getting rhythm, getting comfortable, and landing shots because he punches hard,” added Okolie. “We’ve seen him in the fight against Oleksandr Usyk where he put him down – was it a low blow or not?
“We’ve seen him against Filip Hrgovic who is a really good boxer. He was landing some concussive shots and got the job done, and we’ve seen him against Jarell ‘Baby’ Miller where he outworked him to a stoppage through blood and guts.”
By Tom Ivers