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Perhaps the most striking part of the surge of controlled fury that ended this heavyweight title fight wasn’t the short right or the clubbing left that took Daniel Dubois down midway through the fifth round.
It was Oleksandr Usyk’s smile before the second of those shots. More of a snarl perhaps, or a baring of the gumshield, as Dubois let his arms drop, giving Usyk time to freeze the moment, load up, take aim and unleash a fully extended left hand to the side of the jaw that made Dubois crumple, legs folding under him as his father, Stan, threw in the towel.
This was always huge occasion for both fighters. For Dubois it was a chance to do something unprecedented, uniting the the heavyweight belts on British soil in front of 90,000 people. For Usyk it was another opportunity to assert his own greatness, to walk in with three belts and leave with four, and at the same time complete his constant secondary arc of representing Ukraine in a time of war.
Usyk is now the two-time undisputed heavyweight world champion. Most astonishing of all he seems to find with each of these fights new depths of will, control and finishing venom. Perhaps the best part here was Dubois got to execute his own gameplan, to look sharp, edge a couple of rounds and leave with his reputation, if not enhanced then at least preserved, and to do all this while also being violently outmatched. Facing Usyk at this level must feel like being battered off your feet while being simultaneously triple check-mated, thrashed at Cluedo and losing a game of dominos.
At the end, Usyk said: “I want a rest.” He didn’t look like he wanted a rest, or needed one, or even really understands what one is. He mentioned Tyson Fury, Derek Chisora and Anthony Joshua. Do them all in one night, Oleks. In different ways. With a different walkout, and maybe just a single toilet break.
This was another night when Riyadh season came to Wembley. Fight nights have a kind of festival vibe here, the pitch lassoed into a series of zones and stages, gangways thronged. The crowd was starry in the plush seats. Here is Jake Paul doing a peace sign. Here is Jason Statham in sunglasses. Closer to the ring it was the familiar royal court of influencers, oddballs, showmen faces, movers, shakers, Mr fix-its, Mr pay-for-its.
As the main event approached Wembley had the feeling of a vast, humid, tropical shed, seized with an ever-rising field of event-glamour and title-flash. It felt like a blend of Vegas and a mass celebratory Saturday night out, Sweet Caroline, pints in the air, and all of this mixed with legacy issues, hall-of-famer ascent, the flags of war, the $200m purse, the Saudi project staging.
Michael Buffer appeared, gravely tuxedoed, to do his town crier act. Nadya Dorofeeva, a kind of Ukrainian Cheryl Cole, sang a very affecting champions anthem. God Save the King got the full singalong treatment. Wembley looked magnificently alive, light show thrilling, crowd bobbing along to Chase & Status as Dubois emerged to flames and fireworks, dressed in a stark black T-shirt cut to reveal the vast expanse of his neck, swarming up from the foothills of his tiered and slabbed shoulders.
Dubois waved a fist and looked focused. But there is always going to be a basic imbalance in the energy fields around these two fighters. Usyk is a one-man cause. He’s a battle standard, a living embodiment of his nation’s defiance of the Russian invasion. No boxer has ever represented his country to this degree, travelling the world draped in the flag while a bloody invasion continues in real time. It is an extraordinary state of being.
What does Dubois represent? How does he confront this one-man instrument of war? What is his narrative? Even Tyson Fury managed to concoct a kind of base, a following, the mental-heath activism, the deep male, Iron John, man-of-the-forest vibes. Dubois can’t be the bad guy. He’s a nice guy. He is in effect a one-man project, a sole trader. He represents hard work, clean living and paternal control. He represents the ability to do five thousand press-ups.
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Usyk emerged to boos from the home crowd and cheers from his Ukrainian followers. He doesn’t actually need music and storytelling. He just needs to exist in the middle of all that noise, a cold, still centre, with a beautifully contained sense of menace just in the way he moves. At the weigh in Dubois had flared his neck muscles like a giant salamander. Usyk just stood there, 16lb lighter in his jewellery, all legacy, presence, certainty.
Dubois started as promised, taking the centre of the ring, working behind his jab, following it in a little more. It was an even start, and thrillingly intense from both men. Dubois was working hard, making Usyk think. This is always a high-wire act. Usyk is learning you while you come forward, decoding your moves, building his own own set of counter-patterns.
Dubois brought challenger work rate and disruptive aggression. But there was also a sense of a fighter expending his energy, of Usyk absorbing it, and moving into ever-more dangerous territory. By round five Dubois had slowed. He was being encircled clockwise, picked off with combinations.
Usyk is a small heavyweight by modern super-sized standards (he is the exact same dimensions, height and weight, as Muhammad Ali), but the mistake is to see this as a disadvantage, as opposed to his defining super-strength, bringing with it with it speed, agility, startling power. Here it was the viciousness of his finishing, the sense of a little genuine champion anger, that really stood out.
Dubois deserves credit for being willing to fight everyone in front of him. There is a kind of freedom in this. Defeat here will still leave him in the top tier, with other pathways back towards this level. Usyk, meanwhile, remains in his own distinct space, endlessly adaptable, physically undiminished, a man fighting with a kind of light around him.
