Eddie Hearn has made accusations against Daniel Dubois, claiming he threw two illegal punches during his fight with Anthony Joshua.
Despite being knocked out in the fifth round by Dubois, Hearn pointed out moments where Dynamite seemed to overreact, most notably claiming that Joshua was hit “in the testicles” in the third or fourth round of the fight, which took place on Saturday night.
He expressed his frustration that Joshua did not take full advantage of the time available to him to recover, but also praised Dubois for the decisive victory.
Hearn summed up Joshua’s resilience after the knockout: “I told him he must be proud that he even made it back in the fight because after the second round, for me, the fight was over, it was over.
“Even after the last knockout, he’s trying to get back up.”
The Matchroom boss added: “He couldn’t have tried to do one more inch. When you do that, you can look yourself in the mirror. He came to the end in the trenches. People want to talk about getting down on one knee and spitting out the mouthguard.”
Hearn further stated that the unfortunate low blows could have been due to inexperience, saying: “Listen, when Daniel Dubois hit him in the balls in the third or fourth round, I was yelling at AJ to take the full five minutes.
“It’s actually a bit of inexperience. At that moment, when he couldn’t stand, he was hit full force in the chestnuts.
“He told the referee, ‘It’s all right, let’s go,’ and I said, ‘What are you doing?’ Then it happened again. He just came out to fight tonight. It was a hell of a fight. As devastated as we are, Daniel deserves a lot of credit.”
“Tonight is his coronation night. Without being elevated to interim champion, tonight is the night he showed he is a true world champion. He also has a great future ahead of him.
“Of course I still want to fight. We tried to succeed and we failed. Do we run away now or live to fight another day? I am a warrior. Always walk with your head held high.
“We’ve rolled the dice. It’s 13 world title fights, not all of them have been successful but they’ve all been fun and entertaining. We want to make history in British boxing and I think we’re doing that.”