Oleksandr Usyk says Anthony Joshua made a big mistake in leaning back, which IBF heavyweight champion Daniel Dubois capitalized on in his fifth round knockout win in London.
The unified champion Usyk explains that Joshua (28-4, 23 KOs) should have stood with his head straight up and not leaning back, which Dubois took advantage of repeatedly to drop him four times in their main event fight at Wembley Stadium.
Usyk beat a better version of Joshua in their two fights, and he wasn’t leaning backward like he did against Dubois. It’s unclear if Joshua has been watching films of other fighters and trying to pattern his style after theirs.
AJ had talked about studying the late heavyweight champion Sonny Liston’s fights. However, that guy didn’t lean backward during his battles. Liston was a slugger who would come after his opponents. He’d have been better off if Joshua had mimicked Liston’s old fighting style.
“I’m not shocked because this is boxing. Daniel Dubois today was better,” said Oleksandr Usyk to Boxing King Media, reacting to Anthony Joshua’s loss to Daniel Dubois. “When you step back like this [leaning back], it’s dangerous,” said Usyk about how Joshua was hurt by leaning back against Dubois. “When I beat Joshua a second time, I don’t know what’s next.”
Dubois was coming forward the entire fight, throwing hard jabs and looking to tag Joshua with right hands. In the first round, Dubois connected with a right hand, catching Joshua leaning, and put him down on the canvas. Joshua appeared to never recover from that knockdown.
“I thought I was seeing a man with the face of AJ, but it was completely different inside,” said promoter Alex Krassyuk. “He didn’t look the way we expected him to look. Did you see his right hand? It was all the way on his chest. So, his chin was up. It was like a fairy tale for any boxer, not just for Dubois.”
Joshua has been studying someone and picked up the bad habits that we witnessed tonight against Dubois. He constantly tries to adapt his fighting style rather than being happy using the style that carried him this far in his career.
A better style for Joshua would have been to use the Wladimir Klitschko approach that he’d utilized to defeat Andy Ruiz Jr. in their rematch in December 2019. That might have worked against Dubois if he had come in lighter and was ready to move for 12 rounds. Joshua was too heavy for him to use the Klitschko style.
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