But Dubois’ camp were left seething with the result and are planning to lodge an appeal after claiming he was “cheated” out of victory.
“I didn’t think that was a low blow,” said Dubois. “I thought that landed and I’ve been cheated out of victory tonight. What else can I say? That was a win tonight. But you know what? I’ve got to come again.”
His promoter, Frank Warren, took aim at the referee’s decision to allow Usyk time to recover from the shot after spending five minutes trying to catch his breath.
“It hit him (Usyk) on the waistband. That is all he worked on in camp – working to the body, we see that as a weakness. He got caught and that referee got it badly wrong,” he said.