Anthony Joshua vs. Daniel Dubois full card results as DDD demolishes AJ in Wembley firefight

Dom Farrell

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Anthony Joshua vs. Daniel Dubois full card results as DDD demolishes AJ in Wembley firefight image

WEMBLEY STADIUM, LONDON — Daniel Dubois reduced Anthony Joshua's hopes of becoming a three-time world champion to rubble with a ferocious five-round display of heavyweight destruction at a stunned Wembley.

Boxing at the stadium he made his own with wins over Wladimir Klitschko and Alexander Povetkin in 2017 and 2018 respectively, the stage was set for a resurgent Joshua to rubberstamp a shot at the winner of the rematch between unified champion Oleksandr Usyk and Tyson Fury, each of whom watched the mayhem unfold from ringside amid a British record 96,000 crowd.

Dubois, in possession of the IBF portion of the title, had not read that script and laid waste to a man who has transformed British boxing during his time at the summit. Never say never during this new era of boxing's Saudi heavyweight bonanza, but that time looks to have been shredded to a brutal ending.

WATCH: Anthony Joshua vs. Daniel Dubois, live on DAZN

Joshua overcommitted after spotting an opening towards the end of round one and was decked and discombobulated by a thudding Dubois right. It was a blow from which he never recovered.

Round two was the only session where 'AJ' managed to stay upright and a savage barrage from Dubois at the end of the third that almost battered Joshua through the ropes could reasonably have been the endpoint. It spoke of Joshua's champion spirit that he grappled through the fog of an early fourth-round knockdown to reach the end of the next session. 

Robbed of his equilibrium, Joshua staggered Dubois with an instinctive right hand in the fifth. He had to roll the dice and a beautiful counter right hook from the champion crumpled Joshua to emphatically end the argument.

Joshua strode out into the north-west London night six years on from his previous headline outing at the national stadium. Seven-and-a-half years have passed since his night of nights, when Joshua climbed off the canvas and overcame a foggy mind and heavy legs to thrillingly stop the great Wladimir Klitschko in round 11.

At that time, when no one had heard of Turki Alalshikh or influencer boxing, Joshua was the master of all he surveyed. The Klitschko and Povetkin wins sandwiched two additional stadium nights under Cardiff's Principality Stadium roof against Carlos Takam and Joseph Parker. He was a unified world champion and a national hero ready to go global. In the fight after he dispatched Povetkin, Andy Ruiz Jr. turned Joshua's world upside down in New York. Dubois has thrown it clean off its axis, refusing to let the 34-year-old off the hook in the manner the ageing Klitschko did.

Liam Gallagher treated the Wembley crowd to a trio of Oasis hits before the main event, including Supersonic. Joshua had been in no hurry during the preliminaries, arriving at the stadium shortly before 9 p.m. local time. That was more than an hour after Dubois and questions will now be asked of what looked like unusually lax final preparations from such an experienced campaigner.

Joshua reintroduced himself to familiar surroundings to the strains of the Godfather theme, looking cold and emotionless, in contrast to pyrotechnics that included the flaming AJ display from that unforgettable Klitschko night.

Dubois wasted little time clattering his illustrious foe painfully into the present day. A right to the temple momentarily disorganised Joshua, who appeared to be warming to his task as round one progressed — a solid backhand right finding a home before he just missed with his honey punch of an uppercut.

That encouraged Joshua to fatally overcommit, missing with a winging right and leaving the side of his jaw exposed for Dubois to clatter him to the canvas. The challenger clearly did not have his legs back under him as he retreated in the second, struggling to either hold or avoid Dubois' ramrod jab. A shot around the temple with 25 seconds to go in the round saw Joshua stagger again but he stayed upright until the bell.

The capacity crowd were still with 'AJ', roaring any moment of fleeting success. But the noise reached a howling cacophony as Joshua suffered a messy and painful second knockdown. As he retreated under heavy fire on the ropes, a count started, referee Marcus McDonnell didn't step in and Dubois continued mercilessly beating up his opponent. Finally, a count was administered and if the third man in the ring or Joshua's trainer Ben Davison had ended matters at that point there would have been no complaints — a point underlined by an unfathomably ragged Joshua going down early in the fourth.

He was on the canvas again seconds later, with this one ruled a slip. Fighting on whatever instinct he could muster from within his scrambled synapses, Joshua clipped Dubois with a nice uppercut. That was enough to persuade him to go for broke in round five, with Dubois accepting the invitation for a firefight and closing the show. 

Joshua tumbled to Dubois' feet. Incidentally, just 13 months on from a one-sided defeat to Usyk, that's where a good portion of the heavyweight world now resides for this reborn 27-year-old destroyer.

Anthony Joshua vs. Daniel Dubois fight card results

  • Daniel Dubois (c) def. Anthony Joshua (KO 5/12) for the IBF heavyweight title
  • Hamzah Sheeraz def. Tyler Denny (c) (TKO 2/12) to win the European and retain the Commonwealth middleweight titles
  • Joshua Buatsi def. Willy Hutchinson (SD 12) for the vacant interim WBO light heavyweight title
  • Anthony Cacace def. Josh Warrington (UD 12); Super Featherweights
  • Josh Kelly def. Ishmael Davis (MD 12); Middleweights
  • Josh Padley def. Mark Chamberlain (UD 10); Lightweights

Joshua vs. Dubois undercard: Buatsi closes on world title shot as Warrington drops retirement hint

Former two-time IBF featherweight champion Josh Warrington stepped up to 130 lbs to challenge Anthony Cacace, Joe Cordina's surprise conqueror on the Matchroom vs. Queensbury 5 vs. 5 card in Riyadh earlier this year. Warrington (31-4-1) tried to set his signature rip-roaring pace in the early rounds but could not sustain it as Cacace (23-1) steadied him with solid right hands. The Northern Irishman pulled away during the middle rounds and closed out a unanimous decision win.

Cacace could now be an option for Warrington's old foe Leigh Wood in 2025, while the 'Leeds Warrior' left his gloves in the ring at the end – a hint that he is ready to move into retirement after a fine career.

British light heavyweight Joshua Buatsi moved to 19-0 and dropped Scottish southpaw Willy Hutchinson twice during a gruelling 12-rounder. Hutchinson (18-2) showed incredible guts to reach the final bell, although a 113-112 verdict in his favour was utterly perplexing. Cards favouring Buatsi 117-108 and 115-110 thankfully granted the 31-year-old WBO mandatory status to face the winner of next month's undisputed clash between Dmitry Bivol and Artur Beterbiev.

Following four undercard fights that went the distance — Josh Padley decked and upset the man noted as Turki Alalshikh's "favourite" fighter, Mark Chamberlain before Josh Kelly pot-shotted his way past Liam Smith's late replacement Ishmael Davis — rising middleweight star Hamzah Sheeraz made short work of Tyler Denny in the chief support. "Any 160 name, let's go. Let's have it," a jubilant Sheeraz said after two knockdowns in a second-round TKO that added the European title to his Commonwealth belt.

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Dom Farrell

Dom Farrell Photo

Dom is the senior content producer for Sporting News UK. He previously worked as fan brands editor for Manchester City at Reach Plc. Prior to that, he built more than a decade of experience in the sports journalism industry, primarily for the Stats Perform and Press Association news agencies. Dom has covered major football events on location, including the entirety of Euro 2016 and the 2018 World Cup in Paris and St Petersburg respectively, along with numerous high-profile Premier League, Champions League and England international matches. Cricket and boxing are his other major sporting passions and he has covered the likes of Anthony Joshua, Tyson Fury, Wladimir Klitschko, Gennadiy Golovkin and Vasyl Lomachenko live from ringside.