Daniel Dubois vs Razvan Cojanu March 8

[oogiebe]

Dubois will take on Cojanu on March 8. The fight was first scheduled late last year with Dubois pulling out because of illness.

I don't know. He just faced two step up opponents in Tom Little and (12 rounds) Kevin Johnson. This seems a bit of a step down. Maybe his handlers weren't happy with his performance against Johnson, whose greatest skills are surviving.

[jamamb]

u started a thread on this last week viewtopic.php?f=22&t=227827&p=5084861&hilit=#p5084861

i like dub by stoppage, think he will have more firepower then gorman did

[candyslim]

It's a good match for him at this stage I think. Cajanu is pretty tough and will give him rounds. He'll be doing well to stop him, Joe Parker couldn't manage to.

[HeavyHitters]

D-Dub is gonna roll here! I'd love to see Riddick "Big Daddy" Bowe join Dubois' team. Teach him how to become a superb inside fighter.

[Rob3_142]

It's a good match for him at this stage I think. Cajanu is pretty tough and will give him rounds. He'll be doing well to stop him, Joe Parker couldn't manage to.

I'd say the usually typical sparring partner conundrum played it's part in that one.

I don't think it will tell us much about Dubois this fight, but he might get 6 hard rounds out of it (although I would be surprised if this did not end in two).

I'd like to see Dubois chasing the British title in 2019, and maybe the EBU by end of the year. Then start to consider the ABC rankings start of 2020.

[oogiebe]

It's a good match for him at this stage I think. Cajanu is pretty tough and will give him rounds. He'll be doing well to stop him, Joe Parker couldn't manage to.

I'd say the usually typical sparring partner conundrum played it's part in that one.

I don't think it will tell us much about Dubois this fight, but he might get 6 hard rounds out of it (although I would be surprised if this did not end in two).

I'd like to see Dubois chasing the British title in 2019, and maybe the EBU by end of the year. Then start to consider the ABC rankings start of 2020.

One thing Dubois has is time. His handlers need to further develop him before he has thoughts of rankings. He hasn't shown any better skills to go along with his power over his last several fights. Hopefully he'll show some better abilities vs Cajanu. He really hasn't been hit back yet, so there is a lot we don't know about the lad. Much like Ajagba.

[candyslim]

It's a good match for him at this stage I think. Cajanu is pretty tough and will give him rounds. He'll be doing well to stop him, Joe Parker couldn't manage to.

I'd say the usually typical sparring partner conundrum played it's part in that one.

I don't think it will tell us much about Dubois this fight, but he might get 6 hard rounds out of it (although I would be surprised if this did not end in two).

I'd like to see Dubois chasing the British title in 2019, and maybe the EBU by end of the year. Then start to consider the ABC rankings start of 2020.

Yes the sparring partner angle may well have affected the outcome, that's true although I guess it could be argued that familiarity goes both ways i.e. Joe should have known how best to exploit Cojanu's weaknesses.

I'll be surprised if it ends early. Apart from Luis Ortiz I think I'm right in saying the only other inside distance deteat was by knockout to Donovan Dennis and that was something of a bolt from the blue.

I agree with Ogiebie. He needs to work on his skills rather than worrying about his ranking. He has time on his side and plenty of it.

[Rob3_142]

No doubt about it. In my opinion Dubios could take the best part of 2-3 years taking on good development fights.

Unfortunately, we also live in a world of high expectations. Joshua has set a rare presidence, which Dubios will be to some degree expected to follow. Each fight will be expected to be a step, and whilst he is blowing people away (except perhaps against Johnson - although probably unlucky not to clean him out), some step is what I would expect too.

I still think you can reach world level with low risk fights. But then there will be an expectation to take on Joshua/Fury etc before he's probably ready. It'll be tough to manage that expectation whilst making him relevant. Still would like to see him take the British in 2019, as he's comfortably already at that level.

[candyslim]

He could and he should. As an Olympic champion, Joshua was always going to have the weight of expectation and would inevitably be fast-tracked. He's 8 or 9 years older than Dubois.

The tricky thing is matching Dubois with opponents who will give him good experience and keep him learning. It's important that he doesn't grow complacent effortlessly beating a succession of no-hopers learning nothing in the process, yet equally you don't want to match him too aggressively because once he's taken on a Gerald Washington (for example), it's going to be difficult to go back to a Tom Little or a Kamil Sokolowski. It's important to keep improving the qualitiy of the opposition but in very small steps so as not to move him too fast. In my opinion obviously.