- Prince Naseem Hamed says Daniel Dubois has 'very heavy hands' and 'hits to the body very well' — and that if Dubois 'boxes the way he can fight', Fabio Wardley is in for the fight of his life on May 9.
- Naz has form on big heavyweight reads — he correctly tipped Usyk to break Dubois down in their rematch and his Anthony Joshua call has been on the money for years. This isn't a celebrity prediction.
- Wardley remains the betting favourite — never stopped, granite chin, walks fighters down — but Hamed's body-work warning gives Dubois exactly the underdog narrative Frank Warren's camp needed for the final week.
Right Then — Prince Naz Has Picked The Underdog
Right then. Prince Naseem Hamed has spoken on Wardley vs Dubois, and he has not gone down the easy road. Naz reckons Fabio Wardley has bitten off more than he can chew, and that Daniel Dubois will produce 'the fight of his life' on May 9 in Manchester. The most decorated featherweight Britain has ever produced has just told you the WBO heavyweight champion is in trouble. That matters.
Make no mistake — Hamed picking Dubois is a story. Not because Naz is always right. He is not always right. But because Naz watches fights properly. He watched the Joseph Parker stoppage live, he watched Anthony Joshua eat a long left hand on the way to the canvas, he watched the rebuild from the Usyk loss happen in real time, and he has clearly decided the version of Dubois who walks into the Co-op Live next Saturday night is the dangerous version.
Naz's Reasoning — Heavy Hands, Body Work, Boxing IQ
Hamed's specific case for Dubois comes down to two things. The hands and the body work. 'Daniel Dubois has very heavy hands and hits to the body very well,' Naz said, 'and if he boxes the way he can fight, he will make it very hard for Wardley.'
That is a proper boxing read, that. The 'if he boxes the way he can fight' bit is the giveaway. Naz isn't predicting a Dubois swarm. He is predicting a Dubois who uses his jab, picks his moments, and digs to the body to take Wardley's legs from him before the second half of the fight. Anyone who has watched Dubois at his absolute best — the second Joyce performance, the Hrgovic stoppage, the Anthony Joshua finish — knows that when he boxes properly behind the jab and goes downstairs, he is one of the most physically dangerous heavyweights in the world.
And the body work line is the smart bit. Wardley is a 19-knockout heavyweight himself. He has never been outboxed. He has been pushed late, he has been wobbled, he has been taken to the cards once, but he has never been systematically broken down in the middle rounds. Naz is suggesting Dubois has the physical tools to be the first man who does it.
The Counter — Why Wardley Still Looks Like The Pick For Most
Let's not beat around the bush. The current betting and most of the British press still has Wardley as a clean favourite, and there are reasons. Wardley's chin has been tested at the highest level — Frazer Clarke twice, Justis Huni, the Australian banger, the Joseph Parker night when he came up the levels. He has never been stopped. He has never even been properly wobbled in a way that stayed with him. He gets up, he keeps coming, and he breaks fighters in front of him.
Dubois has been stopped three times. By Joyce, by Usyk in the Wroclaw rematch, and by Joshua before that. Three. That is the case for Wardley in one number. He is the harder man to stop. And when Wardley said this week he intends to 'get straight stuck in' and 'let the guns go and see what lands' — that is a man who fancies the firefight against an opponent who has cracked under fire before.
Hamed's Track Record — Worth Listening To
Here's the thing on Naz. He has been right on enough big fights to make this worth taking seriously. He correctly picked Usyk to outclass Dubois the second time round and called it 'destruction'. He had Anthony Joshua's path mapped out months in advance. And his read on heavyweight boxing — the timing of a long left hand, the importance of the body shot, the way a smaller man can survive against a bigger man through angles — has been sharp for thirty years.
So when Naz looks at Wardley vs Dubois and decides Dubois is the more dangerous fighter on May 9, that is not a celebrity pick. That is a former pound-for-pound world champion saying he has watched the tape and the Manchester crowd is about to be very quiet for ten or fifteen minutes.
What This Means For Fight Week
Wardley camp will not be losing any sleep over Hamed's pick. They have heard this kind of British heavyweight prediction before — 'Wardley is too inexperienced, Dubois is too heavy-handed' — and they have answered it with the most patient build-up of any current British heavyweight champion. But it does feed the underdog narrative around Dubois, which suits him. Dubois fights better when nobody is expecting him to win. He always has.
Frank Warren camp will be quietly delighted. Naz has just handed Dubois exactly the framing he wants for the final week — 'Prince Naz says I will produce the fight of my life.' Expect that line to appear on every Queensberry social post between now and the weigh-in.
Luke's Read — Pick Stays The Same, But Naz Is On Something
My pick has not changed. Wardley to win this, late stoppage, somewhere between rounds 8 and 11, after Dubois lands the cleaner punch in the first three. But Naz's body-work read is the danger and I'm prepared to admit it. If Dubois remembers he is supposed to be a boxer first and a slugger second, he can absolutely make the first half of this fight rough for Wardley. If he doesn't — if he tries to fight Wardley's fight in Wardley's town — he gets stopped again.
Either way, the Co-op Live on May 9 has just got a layer of intrigue it didn't have yesterday. When Prince Naseem Hamed picks the underdog in a British heavyweight title fight, you listen.