IBF heavyweight champion Daniel Dubois is ill and will not fight Joseph Parker this Saturday night on Turki Alalshikh’s card in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. Dubois vs. Parker is off.
A replacement is being sought for Parker (35-3, 23 KOs) to remain on the card, but with only two days’ notice, the options are slim. Dubois-Parker was slated to be the co-feature for Saturday’s rematch between Artur Beterbiev and Dmitry Bivol on DAZN PPV.
Card Shakeup
Ariel Helwani broke the news about Dubois being off the card on Saturday, which is a huge hit for the event. There’s no word whether one of the other undercard fights will be moved up to the chief support.
Fans have shown very little interest in the Dubois-Parker fight during the build-up to Saturday’s event. The reasons for that are the two fighters’ lack of charisma and Parker’s dull fighting style. He’s not must-see TV for fans. It was a bad idea from the get-go to have Dubois vs. Parker as the chief support for this huge card.
The smart solution would be to slide the Vergil Ortiz Jr. vs. Israil Madrimov fight into the co-feature spot and move Parker down below against whoever they dig up for him to fight at the last minute. You can’t expect much. Even if they did find someone talented, would Parker agree to fight them without his arm being twisted? It’s doubtful.
In a perfect world, Martin Bakole would be moved in and be the substitute opponent for Joseph Parker to fight on Saturday night. There’s NO way that Parker would ever agree to that. His chances of winning against Bakole would be slim & none, but it would be fun to watch for the fans. It would be like watching a lion have a meal. Turki wants to create more interest in the sport to bring it back to what it was in the 1960s when Muhammad Ali was on top. Bringing in Bakole would stir up the fans.
If Turki wants to be inventive, he can move Zhilei Zhang or Agit Kabayel in as the opponent for Joseph Parker to fight in the co-feature spot on Saturday’s card. That would be asking a lot for the fighters to take that kind of risk of going up against a different fighter they hadn’t trained for, but it would be interesting for the fans if the idea is to entertain.
This is what I was afraid of. I had a really bad feeling about the Dubois-Parker fight as soon as it was announced, and it turned out to be right.
Last Updated on 02/20/2025
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