Category: Boxing / UFC / MMA

• Addresses media for first time since losing friends in car accident

• Former world champion to return to ring in tune-up for Tyson Fury bout

Anthony Joshua has stressed that rather than coming to terms with his own grief after the car accident in which two of his closest friends died last December, his primary focus has been on helping their parents. As he prepares to resume his career next month, Joshua said: “I’m just there for their parents. Number one is being a good soldier for them. Gotta look after the boys’ parents.”

Asked if he had felt compelled to bury his pain since he was injured in the accident in Nigeria which took the lives of Sina Ghami and Latif Ayodele, Joshua said: “Everyone’s different. Me, I have to put my emotions to the side because I focus on the parents. My emotions can come at a later stage. I really look at the parents and I understand it must be most difficult for them. So I don’t make it about me, I make it about them. I make it about the mums and the dads of the two boys.”

Continue reading...

• Converted kickboxer takes unified champion deep in WBC title bout

• End of round bell may have rung before referee stopped fight

Rico Verhoeven, the Dutch former kickboxer who has switched to boxing, wants an apology as well as a rematch, after being stopped one second before the end of the penultimate round in a WBC title bout with unified world heavyweight champion Oleksandr Usyk last Saturday.

The stoppage was controversial, with Verhoeven feeling he could have continued and some replays suggesting the bell may have rung before the referee signalled the end of the fight — only Verhoeven’s second since switching to boxing — at the Pyramids of Giza in Egypt.

Continue reading...

• Ukrainian keeps unbeaten record with 11th-round TKO

• Dutch kickboxing great threatened to cause huge upset

Oleksandr Usyk, Ukraine’s unbeaten heavyweight world champion, stopped the Dutch former kickboxer Rico Verhoeven with one second remaining in the penultimate round to avoid what would have been one of the greatest boxing upsets of all time on Saturday.

The WBC title fight at the Pyramids of Giza was considered a mismatch but Verhoeven, whose sole previous professional boxing fight was 12 years ago, tore up the script in mind-boggling fashion from the opening bell and had looked set to win.

Continue reading...

Matthew Leutwyler’s film shows how the DRC fighter was inspired by trainer Kibomango after the death of her father

“Clarck Ntambwe originally turned to boxing and went to the gym to learn how to fight so she could kill the guys that murdered her dad,” Matthew Leutwyler says of the young woman whose life story provided the basis for the powerful and moving feature film he wrote and directed against the backdrop of tragic conflict in the Democratic Republic of the Congo. Fight Like a Girl is also inspired by the memory of Leutwyler’s close friend Balezi “Kibomango” Bagunda, a former child soldier turned boxing champion who trained women to fight in the ring.

Ntambwe became one of Kibomango’s star fighters at the women’s boxing club he founded in Goma – the city where the trainer was gunned down soon after the movie was completed. Kibomango was killed by M23 rebels while he was helping Leutwyler evacuate 41 children from a village under attack in eastern Congo.

Continue reading...

The light-heavyweight is a substitute teacher by day but on Saturday delivered a blistering lesson to Cuba’s David Morrell

Last Saturday night in Manchester, Zak Chelli, a 28-year-old supply teacher from Fulham, produced one of the sporting upsets of the year when he knocked out Cuba’s esteemed David Morrell in a stoppage as shocking as it was compelling. Chelli had been offered the fight two weeks earlier and despite the limited preparation he proved himself a formidable late replacement.

Morrell was ahead on the scorecards, but he was hurt badly in the ninth round. In the 10th and last, Mr Chelli – as he is known to his pupils – delivered a blistering lesson before Morrell was rescued by the referee.

Continue reading...

• Former world champion stopped Paul in December fight

• Injuries from bout are still being monitored by doctors

Jake Paul has admitted the broken jaw he suffered during his loss to Anthony Joshua in December may have ended his boxing career.

The YouTuber turned boxer was stopped during December’s fight after a brutal shot from former world champion Joshua. Paul said the injury is still being monitored five months later.

Continue reading...

Saturday’s WBO world heavyweight fight pits fascinating pair armed with knockout power against one another

Daniel Dubois and Fabio Wardley are very different characters but, in the ring, they share a knockout ratio of 95% in the combined 42 fights they have won. The unbeaten Wardley has knocked out 19 opponents in his 20 victories while Dubois has stopped 21 of 22 vanquished rivals. It’s an impressive statistic which belies the vulnerability at the heart of each man.

Wardley, the WBO world heavyweight champion, comes from a white-collar boxing background with minimal experience as an amateur. The only blemish on his record is a draw in March 2024 with the Olympic medallist Frazer Clarke – who he then knocked out with shocking brutality in the first round seven months later. But Wardley was also comprehensively outboxed by Justice Huni last summer before rescuing himself from a shutout defeat by separating the tricky Australian from his senses in a dramatic 10th round. The 31-year-old has often looked to be in trouble against more skilful rivals before his power obliterates the gulf in experience or ringcraft.

Continue reading...

Briton, who defends his WBO title against Daniel Dubois, talks Fury-Joshua, doping and his punditry sideline

“The only expectation I have is that it will end in a knockout,” Fabio Wardley says cheerfully as he looks ahead to his dangerous first defence of the WBO world heavyweight title against Daniel Dubois in Manchester on Saturday night. “Don’t Blink” is the promotional tagline for a battle between two powerful yet vulnerable heavyweights and, for once, this is less boxing bluster than reasonable advice for anyone watching a fight which could be the most dramatic heavyweight contest this year.

Wardley and Dubois are devastating punchers who also often look at risk of losing. Dubois has been beaten three times in 25 fights while dispatching his other opponents with brutal efficiency. Two years ago, the unbeaten Wardley came close to defeat against Frazer Clarke in their first fight, which ended up being a draw after a damaging bloodbath for both men. He knocked out Clarke after two savage minutes in the rematch but then lost every round against Justis Huni before producing a chilling late stoppage of the skilful Australian last June.

Continue reading...

• ‘Signed, sealed, delivered,’ says promoter Eddie Hearn

• Joshua takes on Prenga in Riyadh warm-up in July

The most hyped and regularly ­postponed fight in recent ­British boxing history will apparently take place this year after Anthony Joshua and Tyson Fury agreed terms to meet in the ring. Long in the ­making, and coming far too late in the faded careers of both former world heavyweight champions, the much-delayed showdown will be a guaranteed money-spinner for the fighters and their backers.

Eddie Hearn, who promotes Joshua, could barely contain his glee in an Instagram post that said: “Signed, sealed, delivered! AJ v Fury is on! The biggest piece of business we’ve ever done but more importantly the one we’ve always wanted. Biggest year of AJ’s career coming up, the comeback is on.”

Continue reading...

• Ali Act overhaul would allow unified boxing bodies

• Backers say centralized model would boost revenues

• Critics warn fighters could lose leverage and rights

A US Senate hearing on the future of boxing laid bare a sharp divide over the sport’s direction on Wednesday, as longtime boxing figures including Oscar De La Hoya warned of proposed changes that could erode fighters’ rights while executives aligned with an Ultimate Fighting Championship-backed push for a centralized model argued they would bring structure and investment.

“When one system controls access, choice becomes theoretical, not real,” professional boxer Nico Ali Walsh told lawmakers, framing the stakes of a debate that could dramatically reshape boxing’s economic model. “When that happens, you fight who you’re told to fight or you don’t fight at all.”

Continue reading...

• Heavyweight vows to clear his name with bout cancelled

• Fighter cites elbow treatment and hopes ‘sense prevails’

Lawrence Okolie has pledged to clear his name after a failed drugs test that has led to the cancellation of his heavyweight bout against Tony Yoka this weekend.

The British fighter, a former cruiserweight world champion who moved up to heavyweight, had been scheduled to face the Frenchman in Paris on Saturday. Okolie is the No 1-ranked contender by the WBC, whose belt is held by Oleksandr Usyk.

Continue reading...