Right then. The morning after a heavyweight title fight is normally about the man with the belt. Yesterday it was, briefly, about Daniel Dubois — and then by lunchtime the conversation had moved to the man at ringside in row two with his arms folded and a champagne flute he didn't touch. Agit Kabayel, WBC interim heavyweight champion, 27-0, 19 KOs, fluent in three languages, German-Kurdish, hits like a truck — and finally, after eighteen months of waiting his turn, very visibly the next man in.
Make no mistake about what we saw last night. Kabayel didn't fly to Manchester for the food. He flew over to remind the British boxing press, the WBC, Frank Warren, Frank Smith, every Sky cameraman and every DAZN microphone that he is the man with the receipt. And by 12.48pm on Sunday, Warren had taken that receipt and put it in writing.
What Warren Actually Said
I'll quote it because there's no point dressing it up. Warren, talking on Sky on Sunday morning, asked about Kabayel's position: "It would be [easy to make], but Agit is the next one in. Easy way to do it — if he [Usyk] wants to vacate the belt, he [Kabayel] can fight the winner of this one."
Translation: Warren has stopped pretending the rematch with Wardley is happening straight away — he said separately that the rematch clause exists but won't be triggered "anytime soon" and that both men need "six months at least" off — and he's lined Kabayel up as the genuine next opponent. That's not promoter chat. That's a promoter who controls both sides of the negotiation telling you what the next fight is.
Why Usyk Doesn't Fight Kabayel
Let's not beat around the bush. Usyk's next is Rico Verhoeven at the Pyramids on May 23. After that, Usyk has stated his three-fight exit plan: Verhoeven, then the Wardley-Dubois winner (now Dubois), then Fury in a late-2026 farewell. There is, as the Ukrainian himself has spelled out twice this year, no slot for Kabayel.
Which means one of two things has to give. Either the WBC keeps Kabayel parked as interim champion for another nine months and lets the world title scene plough on without him — which is the path of least resistance and the one Mauricio Sulaiman normally takes — or the WBC strips Usyk and elevates Kabayel to full champion. Warren, who has loud lawyer-shaped opinions on this, has been clear for weeks that he'll push the second option. "If he doesn't [fight Kabayel] then he'll have to vacate the belt or get stripped." That's a quote from yesterday. That's a man preparing the ground.
Dubois Vs Kabayel — The Fight Itself
Now this is the bit that gets me up in the morning. Two of the heaviest punchers in the heavyweight top five, both with WBC and WBO straps in tow, both promoted out of the same office, both with something to prove. Kabayel's body work against Filip Hrgovic in 2024 was the cleanest stoppage of a top-five heavyweight in the last ten years — three rounds, body shots only, Hrgovic on his knees gasping. He did the same to Damian Knyba in three rounds in January — interim title retained, Oberhausen on its feet. He's not a puffed-up European champion. He's a proper heavyweight.
And Dubois? Dubois just climbed off the canvas twice in Manchester to win the WBO. The chin question is gone. The right hand is still in the top three in the heavyweight division. He's a two-time world champion at 28 with the best trainer in Britain in his corner.
Stylistically, this is a pick-em. Kabayel is the better mover, the better body puncher, and crucially — he's the one fighter in the heavyweight top ten who hits to the body harder than he hits to the head. That's a Dubois problem, because Dubois has shown twice (Joyce I, Usyk I) that the right body shot to the right rib will fold him. Levels of body work above what Wardley brought.
Dubois' edge is the right hand and the steadier feet under pressure. Kabayel has been hit cleanly only twice in his career — by Knyba in the second, and by Yoka in 2018 — but he's never been hit by a Dubois right hand. That's the variable. One shot.
Where And When
If — when — this gets made, it's a Riyadh fight. Saudi money pays the unification premium, and both Warren and Kabayel's German camp have history with Turki Alalshikh's stable. Realistic window: October or early November 2026. The British public will groan that it's not at home. They'll watch it anyway.
The alternative — Düsseldorf, Cologne, a German homecoming — is on the table for Kabayel and his team have been pushing it for two years. But unification money beats homecoming money every time. Dubois would travel. He travelled to Wembley for Joshua, he travelled to Saudi for Joshua again, he'd travel to a service station car park for a two-belt fight.
Luke's Read
I'll call it. Usyk-Kabayel is not happening. Usyk's exit plan was published, signed and timestamped by January and there isn't a slot for the German. The WBC will strip — they'll spend three months pretending they won't, and then they will — and Kabayel will get elevated to full champion the week after Usyk-Verhoeven. Dubois-Kabayel for the WBO and WBC then becomes the autumn fight, and it's a brilliant fight.
Prediction: Kabayel by mid-rounds stoppage. The body work breaks Dubois down between rounds five and seven, the corner pulls him out, and Germany has its first real heavyweight world champion since the Klitschko era. If you know, you know — Kabayel is the most underpriced heavyweight of the last decade, and he's been waiting in line politely for too long.
The line is now official. Kabayel is next. Don't blink.