Daniel Dubois Stops Fabio Wardley In Round 11 After Wild Heavyweight War In Manchester

Heavyweight boxing is ridiculous sometimes.

Daniel Dubois hit the deck twice early, looked on the verge of being overwhelmed, then spent the second half of the fight slowly breaking Fabio Wardley apart before forcing an 11th-round stoppage in a brutal main event war in Manchester.

It was messy, violent, dramatic and exactly the kind of fight people hoped for when this got announced. Dubois leaves with the WBO World Heavyweight title and Wardley loses his unbeaten record after the toughest fight of his career.

Main Event

Dubois improved to 23-3-0 with an 11th-round TKO win over Wardley, who dropped to 20-1-1.

The mad part is Dubois was down once in the 1st round and again in the 3rd. Wardley came out like he genuinely believed he could run straight through him, and for a while it looked possible.

But Dubois stayed composed. That mattered.

Once the pace settled, the heavier shots started landing from Dubois and the fight slowly shifted. Wardley’s face told the story by the later rounds. His nose was badly cut, the right eye was swelling, and the punishment was starting to pile up.

By round 11, Howard Foster had seen enough and waved it off after another sustained Dubois attack.

Absolute chaos of a heavyweight fight. No surprise people were already throwing around “fight of the year” comments before the ring was even cleared.

Co-Main / Key Fights

Jack Rafferty moved to 27-0-1 after stopping Ekow Essuman via sixth-round RTD in a seriously impressive performance.

Essuman, now 22-3-0, was cut over the left eye in round three and never really managed to slow Rafferty down after that. Rafferty’s pressure and work rate steadily took over the fight, and the scorecards reflected it before the retirement: 60-54 twice and 59-55.

Big win for Rafferty. Probably the kind of performance that pushes him into much bigger conversations now.

Zak Chelli pulled off one of the night’s standout results by stopping David Morrell in the 10th round.

Morrell drops to 12-2-0 while Chelli improves to 17-3-1. Bit of an upset on paper, but Chelli fought like somebody who completely believed he belonged there from the opening bell.

Bradley Rea also made a statement, stopping Liam Cameron in round four.

Cameron was dropped twice in the fourth before the referee stepped in. Rea moves to 22-2-0 while Cameron falls to 24-8-1.

Undercard

Gavin Gwynne edged out previously unbeaten Khaleel Majid via majority decision over 10 rounds.

The scorecards came in 96-94 twice for Gwynne, with the third judge scoring it 95-95. Gwynne, now 19-4-2, fought through cuts over both eyes caused by head clashes to hand Majid his first defeat.

Bakhodir Jalolov improved to 17-0-0 after Agron Smakici retired after round seven of their heavyweight bout.

Jalolov never looked particularly troubled and continues to feel like somebody heavyweight boxing is slowly building toward bigger nights for.

Mike Perez outpointed unbeaten cruiserweight Franklin Arinze over eight rounds.

Perez moves to 32-3-1 with the points win while Arinze suffers the first defeat of his career, dropping to 10-1-0.

Javokhir Ummataliev needed just two rounds to knock out Damian Drabik.

Drabik was counted out after being floored by a left hand to the head. Ummataliev improves to 2-0-0 while Drabik falls to 5-3-0.

Fawas Aborode and Garth Noot ended in a verdict score draw over four rounds.

Bobbi Flood moved to 2-0-0 with a four-round points win against Nathan Darby, who drops to 3-38-3.

Issiah Hamilton-Allen also stayed unbeaten, improving to 2-0-0 after outpointing Connor Goulding over four rounds.

Closing

People expected violence from Wardley vs Dubois and they got plenty of it.

Dubois surviving those early knockdowns and then coming back to stop Wardley probably tells you more about him than any straightforward win ever could.

Manchester got a proper heavyweight war.