Wardley Wants Round Two: Rematch With Dubois Set for October 17

Fabio Wardley isn't interested in a long think about it. Days removed from an eleventh-round stoppage loss to Daniel Dubois, he activated his rematch clause the second the contract allowed — and now the sequel is official for October 17 at the O2 Arena in London. Both men confirmed it at the opening presser this week.

The stakes: Dubois defends his WBO belt with a 23-3 record and 22 knockouts, while Wardley (20-1-1, 19 KO) sits at #4 in the heavyweight rankings and tries to erase the only clean defeat on his ledger. The first fight was a war, and Wardley took the worst of it late before Dubois closed the show in the eleventh.

Wardley Owns It

Wardley didn't hide behind the beating. He said he has zero excuses for the loss and zero going into the rematch, and he argued that a lot was made of how the fight looked — reminding everyone that two big heavyweights trading leather tend to leave the ring with a cut or a bruise. He's been through wars like that before, he said, and gone straight back into rematches without drama.

His most honest admission was about the fight itself. Wardley reckons he got too comfortable after dropping Dubois early and again in the third, thinking he'd already cracked the code. He got trigger-happy chasing the right hand, and when he had Dubois hurt, he didn't jump on him hard enough. Those are fixable problems, and he says the camp has spent this window fixing them.

Dubois Keeps It Simple

The champion's message was less complicated. Dubois framed the first win as a game plan executed — chip away, get the job done, take what he came for. He plans to walk in again as champion and lean on his skill and pedigree. For a man whose only recent blemishes came against the sport's elite, confidence isn't the issue.

There's history worth noting here too: Dubois handed Filip Hrgovic a defeat that Hrgovic later admitted nearly pushed him out of boxing. That's the kind of damage a Dubois night can do, and Wardley walked straight into it once. Whether he can walk out differently on October 17 is the whole point of running it back so fast — no cobwebs, no nerves, and by his own account, ready for war.