LONDON: Daniel Dubois will put his International Boxing Federation world heavyweight title on the line on Saturday in a mouth-watering clash with Anthony Joshua at Wembley Stadium.
The pair will battle it out in front of a reported post-war British record crowd of 96,000.
Dubois has said this week he needed to justify his status as the IBF champion, which he claimed in June when Ukrainian Oleksandr Usyk vacated the title.
For Joshua, it marks a chance at redemption and he has said a victory would finally end the difficult period he endured since a 2019 loss to Andy Ruiz and a pair of defeats against Usyk.
17:00 - Opening the Riyadh Season, super lightweight fighters Mark Chamberlain and Josh Padley squared off at a rapidly filling Wembley Stadium.
With 96,000 due for the main event, those who were gathered for this first bout certainly made their voices heard.
Neither Chamberlain nor Padley had lost in their preceding respective 16 and 14 fights.
For Chamberlain, 12 of those victories had come by knock out, while Padley had landed knock outs in all of his.
This fight wasn’t to go that way, as chants of “Blue Army” - in reference to Chamberlain’s home city of Portsmouth - and “Padley” rang out.Indeed both pugilists seemed to recognise the quality of their opponent with the opening rounds proving tentative.
Of the two, Padley was the more aggressive, hurling a volley of shots.
Later, the stats would show Chamberlain had landed an ever so slightly higher percentage of his shots.
Eventually Padley’s determination would pay off, a left hook knocking chamberlain down halfway through the 8th round.
He was not down for long though.
And it seemed to spark some urgency in the Pompey lad.
But as the bell rang out to end the 10th round, Padley seemed far more assured he’d done enough to gain the judges favour.
And the audience agreed, with just 37 percent giving the win to Chamberlain. When the results were announced Padley had won unanimously, with the judges scoring it 95-93, 96-92, and 96-92 in his favour.