Oleksandr Usyk rules out that the controversial low blow he received from Daniel Dubois in the fifth round would have meant a knockout if the referee had started to count. The unified heavyweight champion insisted that if the referee had considered it a legal hit and started counting him, he would have gotten up.
You cannot win by being dirty: Oleksandr Usyk
In the fifth round of their clash last Saturday night in Poland, Daniel Dubois landed a body shot on Usyk that appeared to hit the border of the belt, making it a legal punch. However, Oleksandr Usyk dropped to the ground complaining of a low blow, and the referee called it an unintentional foul.
The Ukrainian could not get up, his legs did not respond to him, and even one of his arms trembled. The referee gave Usyk several minutes to recover, which has raised many eyebrows among the boxing fandom.
All that being said, Usyk is certain that if the blow had been judged legal by the referee he would have gotten up and beat the count.
“For me, 100%, if the referee started to count, I would have definitely jumped up,” Usyk said in a recent interview with Boxing King Media. “I would be on my feet. It would be hard for me to recuperate and come back to my normal state, but there is no doubt that I would be up. It’s not a good thing when people try to get the victory using those dirty tactics. You cannot win by being dirty. You have to be clear.”
“If at any point I saw the referral start the count, even though he was in a lot of pain, I probably would have stood up,” Usyk told Seconds Out in a separate interview. “Daniel probably would have jumped on me to finish me off, but I would have found a way out of those situations.”.
“If you want to know what kind of pain it was, I need to hit you, so you can feel it, but I don’t intend to do it, or to cause people pain,” Usyk went on. “You can overcome a blow to the liver or stomach, but when the blow reaches lower it feels like the pain is burning inside you. It just hurts, it’s a pain that only by going through it can you know what it feels like”.
