Daniel Dubois Talks Legacy Ahead of October 17 Wardley Rematch, Already Eyeing Tyson Fury

Daniel Dubois wants to be remembered as a legend. First he has to get past Fabio Wardley again.

The two British heavyweights rematch on Saturday, October 17, at London's O2 Arena, with the fight airing on DAZN pay-per-view and DAZN Ultimate Tier. It's a direct result of the rematch clause Wardley triggered after their first meeting.

That first fight, on May 9 at Manchester's Co-op Live Arena, was a mess in the best way. Dubois (23-3, 22 KOs) hit the canvas in the first round and again in the third, looking finished early. Wardley (20-1-1, 19 KOs) couldn't close the show. Dubois clawed back, turned the fight in the sixth, and stopped Wardley 28 seconds into the 11th round after Wardley's nose had been split open and his right eye was swelling shut, according to The Independent, which called it a fight-of-the-year contender.

Wardley summed up the beating afterward in blunt terms. "My body failed me but not my heart. And that I can live with," he said, per The Independent. He also insisted weeks later that the damage "was not as bad as it looked," despite needing makeup to cover a nose injury during media appearances.

Dubois says he's improved, "doubled"

Dubois isn't shy about where he thinks this is headed. "Even better and even smoother than last time," he told Queensberry, as reported by Ring Magazine. "I feel like I've improved and, having been the champion, I've improved double. That's some boxing history I've got, a two-time world champion, and now I need to go down as a legend."

The two-time champion claim is accurate. Dubois won the IBF title with a knockout of Anthony Joshua at Wembley Stadium in September 2024, then lost it when Oleksandr Usyk stopped him in the fifth round of their rematch for undisputed status the following July. He added the WBO belt by beating Wardley in May.

But Boxing News 24 pushed back hard on the legacy talk, and the underlying record supports the skepticism. Oleksandr Usyk has beaten Dubois twice inside the distance. Joe Joyce has also stopped him. And Wardley, the man he's about to fight again, put him on the canvas twice in their first meeting. "Claiming substantial improvement is easy; showing how he will prevent Fabio from landing those damaging punches is the test," the outlet wrote, noting that Dubois's knockout of Joshua, while his best win, says little about how he matches up against the sport's other elite heavyweights given Joshua's own well-documented vulnerability to heavy punches.

That's a fair read of the numbers. Dubois has one signature win, over Joshua, and two losses to the man widely considered the best heavyweight alive. Calling himself a legend before closing the book on Wardley, let alone unifying belts, is getting ahead of the résumé.

Fury looms, but Dubois says he's not looking past Wardley

Dubois told Sky Sports News he's already eyeing a showdown with Tyson Fury if both men win their next fights. Fury is set to meet Anthony Joshua on December 11 in a heavyweight mega-fight. "What a fight that would be. It's like me and AJ all over again. That sort of magnitude," Dubois said. "Frank [Warren] would love it, he's got both of us."

He also gave his prediction for the Fury-Joshua fight itself: "I think Fury. Everyone's been talking about this fight for such a long time. It'll be good to see them both get into the ring. Two legends of British boxing."

To his credit, Dubois tempered the Fury talk with the obvious caveat. "Let's be real, I don't even care about that fight. I'm not looking past Fabio at all. One fight at a time," he told Sky Sports News. He also argued Wardley should have had the first fight stopped sooner, saying of Wardley's corner, "They were gambling with him."

The rematch will be staged at a venue with a similarly sized crowd to the first bout, with The Independent putting Manchester's turnout near 18,000 and the O2 capacity near 20,000. It marks the third fight involving British boxers for a world heavyweight title held in Britain this year, and the first time two British heavyweights have met in a rematch for a world title.

None of the Fury talk means anything if Wardley repeats what he did in round one back in May. Dubois gets his answer, and possibly his next opponent lined up, on October 17 at the O2.